Mom accused of enlisting 10-year-old to poison his dad found guilty, WA official says
A Washington woman was found guilty of first-degree solicitation to commit murder after she tried to convince her 10-year-old son to kill his father last summer, officials say.
Vanessa Valdiglesias-Lavalle, 37, of Mount Vernon was also convicted of first-degree solicitation to commit assault with a noxious substance after telling her son to put rat poison in her estranged husband’s food and drinks, according to the Skagit County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office.
On June 4, a Skagit County sheriff sergeant reached out to Mount Vernon police about a Child Protective Services referral that included “an audio recording involving the mother giving instructions to one of her children on how to kill the child’s father,” an officer wrote in the probable cause affidavit.
“This is a secret between you and me to keep forever,” Valdiglesias-Lavalle told her son in the recording, the affidavit says.
Valdiglesias-Lavalle and her husband are in the midst of a divorce and have been separated for about five years, a spokesperson for the prosecutor’s office told McClatchy News during a phone interview. The custody battle has been contentious and the defendant had to pay child support by June 2020, according to the Skagit Valley Herald.
According to the affidavit:
The defendant’s son secretly recorded the conversation with his mother, when she told him if he put “venom” in his father’s food and wine, “they would be together forever and ever” after he died.
Officers told Valdiglesias-Lavalle on June 5 that her husband had died, to which she had no reaction, when he had not. When asked if her husband “had ever been suicidal,” she said “he had previously threatened to kill her, the boys and himself” and that there was a history of domestic violence between her and the estranged husband.
Valdiglesias-Lavalle denied ever thinking about killing or hurting her estranged husband.
When asked what should happen to the boys if her husband passed away, Valdiglesias-Lavalle said she should get custody.
“When she was told that it looked like she was telling her kids how to kill him she again talked about being scared for her boys,” according to the affidavit. “She spoke about teaching them how to protect themselves. She spoke about different options being the police, kill them or an accident.”
An officer interviewed the son, who said his mother “laughed and giggled” about “putting rat poison on the food” even after the recording ended.
Valdiglesias-Lavalle’s sentencing has not yet been scheduled, the prosecuting attorney’s office said in an email to McClatchy. A status hearing will take place Thursday.
This story was originally published April 12, 2021 at 5:39 PM with the headline "Mom accused of enlisting 10-year-old to poison his dad found guilty, WA official says."