Shope, Edward: 1975
Five-year-old (Leonard) Edward Shope, Jr., died at Mercy Hospital on April 23, 1975. The coroner, Harold Troxell, said the Altoona boy died of a massive hemorrhage caused by injuries to his head and body, consistent with being beaten. Irma E. Shope was his mother; the boy’s father had been killed in a car accident a year before.
Mrs. Shope took her son to the emergency room at Mercy Hospital at 6:55 a.m. the morning of the 23rd. She stated they had been throwing darts in the backyard about 7:30 p.m. the evening of the 22nd. She had told him to go to the house and get his coat; he started toward the home, but fell over, semi-conscious. The following morning at 6:30 she found him unconscious and took him to the hospital.
Mrs. Shope, 24, was charged with involuntary manslaughter and arraigned before District Justice Forrest Bartholomew. She was remanded to jail when she could not post $30,000 bond. The Coroner, B. Harold Troxell, ruled the boy died of multipe injuries to the head and entire body. Logan Township police said she had also beaten her daughter, Jennifer, the same day.
Pennsylvania Superior Court Reports
COM. v. SHOPE, 249 Pa. Super. 331 (1977)
Decided October 6, 1977.
This is an appeal from the judgment of sentence of the Court of Common Pleas of Blair County by the defendant-appellant, Irma Edith Shope, after a plea of guilty to charges of involuntary manslaughter and two counts of endangering the welfare of children. The charges were filed resulting from the death of Leonard Edward Shope, Jr., age five. She was sentenced on involuntary manslaughter to undergo imprisonment in the State Correctional Institute for Women at Muncy for a period of not less than two and one-half (2 1/2) years nor more than five (5) years.
