Columnist Susan Snyder: We all grieve for Adacelli

Friday, Aug. 19, 2005 | 6:09 a.m.

Susan Snyder's column appears Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursday and Sundays. Reach her at snyder@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4082.

WEEKEND EDITION

August 20-21, 2005

Some of what Adacelli Louise Snyder lacked in life, she gained in death:

Compassion, pink balloons and adults who considered her precious.

On Thursday about 100 people turned out to say goodbye to the 2-year-old with cerebral palsy who died June 29 because, authorities said, her parents failed to feed her.

"It just chilled me," said Thelma Gallow, who attended the ceremony at Woodlawn Cemetery with her 12-year-old grandson, Eric Gallow-Culp.

"I wish I had known the child before. I would've helped," Gallow said. "But look where she is now. Why would she want to be here anyway? It's a crazy world."

A world in which adults fail. They fail to take care of those they have brought into it. They fail to call upon those who can help. And their system fails by placing an adult's biological rights far above a child's human and civil ones.

At age 2, Adacelli weighed 11 pounds -- barely more than what some babies weigh at birth. She and her three siblings, ages 5 or younger, suffered from malnutrition, head lice, insect bites and other shackles of neglect.

Mariellen Yappel and her fiance, Wayne Colosky, didn't know Adacelli but failed to understand how any child could be laid to rest in an unmarked grave with only cemetery workers present. So they planned Thursday's ceremony with donated services from pastors, the cemetery and florists.

They also started a fund to pay for a memorial bench to mark Adacelli's. In less than a week, Colosky and his Texas Station coworkers donated more than $1,000.

"This wasn't corporate. This was people giving $5 or $10, because it's all they had," Yappel said. "One cocktail waitress came up and said, 'Here's all my tips.' "

Once the memorial began, the ragged sobs of Keli Cruz unsettled the strangers gathered to mourn a little girl for whom cerebral palsy was but one burden she carried.

Cruz, 25, is Adacelli's godmother. She and Adacelli's mother, Charlene Snyder, had known each other about seven years in what Cruz described as a sometimes rocky friendship. Snyder and her husband, Jack Richardson, have been charged with second-degree murder and multiple counts of child abuse or neglect.

Cruz said she offered rides to Snyder and Adacelli for the tot's doctor appointments and helped Snyder clean house. But the mess always returned quickly. She hadn't been called upon to help in the months before Adacelli died.

"When I would go over there, I'd ask to see Adacelli, and (Snyder) would say, 'Oh, she's sleeping,' " Cruz recalled.

Cruz said she considered calling Child Protective Services many times.

"But I was in fear that my god-babies would be taken away from me, and I would never see them again," Cruz said.

Kasey Biehl raised more than $600 from her Beatty neighbors for Adacelli's memorial bench. She and her 10-year-old daughter Lily drove to Las Vegas for the ceremony. Lily and about 30 other children released pink balloons after the service. She had her own reasons for being there.

"We're here because of my 2-year-old brother," Lily said. "He's, well, he's fat and happy."

Donations for Adacelli Snyder's headstone fund can be made at any Las Vegas Valley US Bank branch.