Posted on 03/16/2006 5:36:30 AM PST by FerdieMurphy
A toppled candle destroyed the home and belongings of an out-of-work nurse and her 10 children
During the late-afternoon confusion, a candle flame grew Monday into a potentially deadly blaze in the home where Kerren Laitaille had been raising her 10 children.
In a matter of minutes, the fire destroyed family pictures, most of their clothes, beds, just about everything they owned. Everything, that is, except their faith.
“It’s shown me I’m blessed with my kids and shown me people do care and are there for you,” Laitaille said Wednesday morning in her all-too-temporary home: a room at Hawthorn Suites in North Naples.
After the fire, the Collier County Red Cross set her up in the plush hotel room for three days, and the hotel offered an additional day at its own expense. That gave Laitaille, a 34-year-old out-of-work nurse and single mother, until 11 a.m. Friday to find a new place.
She doesn’t know what she will do when check-out time arrives. Her old home, which she rented, is no longer inhabitable.
In the meantime, her children, who range in age from 5 months to 15 years, have been watching television and playing video games to pass the time. Those who are old enough to go to school can’t because they don’t have a change of clothes.
For her part, Laitaille has been living in a controlled state of anxiety. Reading the Bible, she said, has kept doubt from consuming her the way the fire raged through her Golden Gate house.
Like most fires, this one started small.
Someone, perhaps one of the younger children, accidentally upended a candle in the master bathroom. The flame must have landed on or near a clothes basket because it spread quickly, said Victor Hill, a spokesman with the Golden Gate fire department.
A pungent odor filled the house at 5280 20th Place S.W. When Laitaille opened her bedroom door to see what was the matter, she encountered a wall of flames. She hollered for everyone to get out.
One of her sons, 13-year-old Derrick St. Claire, guided the others to safety, displaying remarkable calm.
“First, I had to get the small ones out,” the boy recalled Wednesday. “Then, I had to get the girls out, and then the rest of the boys out. Then we had to dial 911. We had everyone out of the house and safe.”
Golden Gate firefighters received the call at 5:55 p.m. and arrived at the house three minutes later, Hill said. Smoke poured from the eaves of the roof, making the house resemble a pot of boiling water with the lid still on top. The fire would go on to cause $50,000 in damage, Hill added.
Within 10 minutes, the fire was under control, but Laitaille’s life was spinning in the other direction.
A neighbor she had never spoken to before would turn out to be what Laitaille later called a “guardian angel.” The woman, a single mother of five children herself, tried to calm a disconsolate Laitaille and urged her not to re-enter the burning home.
Barbara Bekich, 38, stayed with the family for three hours in front of their ruined home as firefighters finished putting out the fire and concluded their investigation. She raided her children’s closets to give the family clothes and brought them diapers, Pop Tarts, water and Cheezits.
“Really,” Bekich said of Laitaille, “she needed a hand held.”
More help came when the Red Cross gave the family a $400 debit card to help replace clothes and other items lost to the fire. Laitaille said Wednesday she hadn’t used the card yet because she thought it hadn’t been activated.
But Jerry Welty, emergency services director for the Collier Red Cross, said it was ready to use when he handed it to her. Laitaille and her family were one of three families the Collier Red Cross has helped after fires during this week alone, Welty said.
Welty said he couldn’t remember the agency ever dealing with such a large single family. The suite the charity rented for her has three king-size beds and a pull-out sofa.
Laitaille, a native of the Bahamas who moved to Miami at 7 years of age, decided from an early age she wanted a big family. That way, each child would have someone to rely on and be relied upon. She was once engaged to be married to the man who fathered eight of her children, but he moved back to the east coast instead.
Since her van broke down two months ago, she has been unable to work as a private nurse and has been living on child support. A family friend this week put up the money to rent a van for her to get around.
Welty said that since the Red Cross only offers short-term help, he hoped another charity would step in by the end of the week to help the family find housing.
Laitaille, who grew up in the Baptist church, has turned to her faith to ease her frayed emotions. On Tuesday night, she read the comforting Psalm 23 seven times.
“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want,” it reads. “He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul. ...”
Explain why this woman is not a fit parent? Be careful what you wish for...there are 10 kids under 18. Foster care is expensive for the taxpayer. Isn't that all you really care about?
Are you personally willing to take those children in?
She probably can't work because she can't afford a babysitter or daycare. The fifteen year old might be some help. However, it probably would be negligent to leave that many kids with any one babysitter. Just like it was "negligent" to have that many kids without being in a stable marriage.
It really doesn't matter to me when she had her first child.
I am offended by the tittilations you and some others here have been giving this woman.
Excuse me,but there are many women that waited until they were married to have children and then the marriage didn't work out.
One never knows how things can turn out in live and a ceremony,wedding band and marriage certificate is no guaranty for happily ever after.
It seems to me that everyone jumped on the band waggon of trashing this woman on the assumption,that she was living on welfare and not providing for her own.
I still have yet to find, where in this article it states that she has been receiving Public assistance.
Please point out that fact.
BTW,who are we to judge someone?
The simple fact of public schooling means that she is being massively subsidized (to the tune of $100,000/year plus) by other citizens via the coercive force of government.
That qualifies every last one of us (assuming we all pay taxes) to criticize.
Now...why don't you tell me your source of reference for your opinions, and we'll have a talk. I'm serious.
Worth repeating.
An excellent post, BTW.
With the help of two johns, this 'ho gave birth to eight more potential thugs.
Too bad she didn't stay in the Bahamas!
She wasn't when she made her first baby with him. It also happens that Florida hasn't recognized common-law marriages since 1968, so technically they were not common-law married at any point in time.
Technically she is married to him byway of common law.
Technically she is not, per Florida statute section 741.211.
Maybe she's embarassed for being abandoned after all that time.
Embarrassment didn't stop her from finding at least one other man to make babies with. A person with a half a brain would say, "Gee, if my 'fiancé' would dump me after ten years or so, maybe I shouldn't be opening my knees to another baby-maker without a wedding ring?"
You might better look up "tittilation" before you go getting offended. I can assure you I have never given her the slightest tittilation! Since she has never even heard of me, she certainly can never have been tittilated by me.
Excuse me,but there are many women that waited until they were married to have children and then the marriage didn't work out.
We're not talking about them, we're talking about Laitaille, who made ten children with at least two men, none of whom she ever married.
It seems to me that everyone jumped on the band waggon of trashing this woman on the assumption,that she was living on welfare and not providing for her own.
Who said anything about her being on welfare?
"How is she supposed to take the kids to daycare, then transfer for a couple of hours(I've ridden buses when my transmission died), get to your job on time, then do it again to pick up the little ones? Get real."
The point of many of the posts here, which you seem to denigrate, is that she should have considered these things before having 10 children. (Perhaps she should have gotten a clue somewhere between child 4 and child 5 that juggling childcare and work becomes increasingly difficult with the more children you have?) I lament the tragedy of the house fire, but this gal deserves no sympathy for pumping out 10 kids when she is unmarried and apparently on the edge financially. I just cannot help but believe that all sorts of public (i.e., taxpayer) assistance will be on the way. If this is her contribution to our society, it would be cheaper for us to pay for one-way tickets for her and her children back to the old country.
Oh, I don't know - perhaps the fact that her (apparently unsupervised) kids could easily have been burned alive in the house after they set it on fire with candles?? That certainly sounds like child endangerment to me.
I don't know if cows or sows are capable of being tittilated, and I have no idea what tittilates Ms. Laitaille--so I can certainly not claim that she is tittilated in the same fashion as cows or sows.
(Hint: to "tittilate" means to "sexually arouse," or to "tickle." Nobody here is tickling Ms. Laitaille, and unless she's a Freeper, I can't see how they're arousing her either.)
This simpleton is nothing but a breed sow.
She's 34, and was in a relationship for at least 10 years to produce 8 children by the same man. Does your apparent hatred of this woman blind you to the elementary facts of this story?
Haven't you ever stayed in a hotel? The video games are IN the room connected to the TV.
Thank you.
What you don't know is that some of these children are virtually kidnapped from their parents. Parents who just needed a little help when the going got rough, or they dared to homeschool,etc. OTOH, I'm sure you're familiar with all the precious little babies who were in danger, and ended up dead, due to lack of diligence from these same agencies!
It's all true, but the problem is, what do we do now? There's no easy solution to this mess. But it's still best that the mother and children be kept together. They need help, which is best provided privately.
>How do you know that the youngest children were not fathered by her common law husband? <
Well, let's look at the article:
"One of her sons, 13-year-old Derrick St. Claire, guided the others to safety, displaying remarkable calm."
Then we have, "“I lost everything,” said Kerren Laitaille, top right, holding her 5-month-old baby, Samuel Brown, after her home burned down on Monday."
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