Jailed Parents Told to Show Baby

A T T L E B O R O, Mass., Feb. 14, 2002 -- A couple who belong to a small religious sect that eschews modern medicine have been jailed for contempt of court after they refused to give information about a baby the couple says was never born.

David and Rebecca Corneau say Rebecca was pregnant, but suffered a miscarriage in November. State child welfare officials, however, think the baby may have been born and that the parents are hiding the child or the truth about what happened to it.

The Corneaus belong to a religious sect called "The Body" that is comprised of 13 adult residents of Attleboro, a town about 10 miles northeast of Providence, R.I. Members shun modern medicine, education and the government. They will not even wear eyeglasses. Authorities say the group is a cult that endangers the lives of children.

The couple hid a previous stillbirth from state authorities, and three other members of the group face charges in connection with the 1999 death of a 10-month-old baby who prosecutors say was starved to death.

Judge Kenneth Nasif of Attleboro Juvenile Court ordered the Corneaus jailed for contempt for 30 days for failing to either produce their live baby or say where the miscarried fetus is buried.

When Rebecca Corneau was pregnant with another child in 2000, Nasif ordered her locked up to ensure the safety of the baby. The infant girl, called "Baby Corneau" by the court, was placed in foster care. The couple's three elder children are also in state custody.

Two Tiny Bodies

"The Body" came to authorities' attention in 1999, when two children of sect members were believed to be missing. David Corneau, the father of one of the missing children, was sent to jail when he refused to help find them. When he was granted immunity, he led investigators to a remote state park in Maine, where they found two tiny bodies.

One was that of the Corneaus' son, Jeremiah, who had died during home childbirth. The Corneaus were not prosecuted, but state officials attribute the baby's death to their rejection of modern medicine.

"If there had been proper medical attention Jeremiah would be alive today," said Harry Spence, commissioner of Massachusetts Department of Social Services.

The other body was that of Jeremiah's cousin, a 10-month-old boy named Samuel. The medical examiner said Samuel died of starvation. Prosecutors filed murder charges against his parents, sect leader Jacques Robidoux and his wife Karen, alleging that they failed to feed him because they believed God did not want the infant to eat much.

State Scoops Up Sect Children

The state social services department then moved to take away all children of sect members. Nasif had the Corneaus' three daughters placed in foster care and ordered Rebecca Corneau confined during her 2000 pregnancy.

Last year, when word got out that Rebecca might be pregnant again, social services officials tried to take action. They searched the Corneaus' home but found nothing. Suspecting the baby had already been born, social services officials took the couple to court to force them to produce the mystery baby.

For weeks, citing their rights to privacy and freedom of religion, the Corneaus refused to cooperate or even say whether the mystery baby had been born. Nasif rejected their claims of privilege and ruled there was enough evidence that Rebecca Corneau did have a baby late last year. He called the mystery baby "Corneau Two."

Then, on Tuesday, the couple's lawyer, J.W. Carney, told the court there had been a pregnancy but that it ended in a miscarriage in November.

"Mrs. Corneau suffered a miscarriage," Carney said. "There is no live Baby Corneau Two. There never has been a live Baby Corneau Two. And we intend to ask this court to dismiss the petition for care and protection of a child that never existed."

After a closed-door hearing, Nasif said the couple had failed to convince him that a miscarriage had occurred. He ordered them jailed for contempt for refusing to either produce a live baby or to say where the fetus was buried.

Protection or Harassment?

Officials at the social services department see it as the state's duty to protect the Corneau children.

"How could we protect this child from the fate of two previous children — of dying from lack of medical attention, or worse, being killed through starvation or some other action of the family?" said Spence, the department head.

But Carney says that the state is simply harassing the couple.

"Rebecca and David Corneau have not just been prosecuted but persecuted by the state of Massachusetts for the last three years," he said.