When a malnourished and dehydrated 7-year-old died in Grand County with deadly levels of sodium in his blood, the response from the Grand County Sheriff’s Office was to send an investigator and an assistant county coroner to assure the child’s parents that the investigation would go no further and that documents surrounding the death would never be made public.
A Colorado boy likely died from drinking too much olive brine. Grand County tried to make the suspicious case disappear.
Grand County Sheriff Brett Schroetlin made good on the 2020 promise to Isaiah Stark’s parents. This year, he refused to release to The Denver Post any documents and videos related to the investigation, saying it would be “contrary to the public’s interest.” Schroetlin is hiding behind bad laws to prevent public scrutiny of how his department, the coroner and the district attorney handled the death investigation.
The public’s interest in this case is more than justified. Anytime a child dies under suspicious or questionable circumstances, there must be an investigation. The records The Post was able to obtain from other, less obstructionist sources cast serious doubt on whether a thorough investigation ever took place, despite the fact that records also show officials received reports that the boy had been forced to drink olive brine, which is high in sodium content, as a punishment.
Fortunately, Colorado’s child protection ombudsman and the state’s Child Fatality Review Team have not allowed Stark’s 2020 death to slip silently into history, unmarked and uninvestigated. The Post’s Sam Tabachnik used records obtained from both to produce an in-depth news story that was published last Sunday. Unfortunately, the review team did not release all the documents from its investigation, something they can and should do immediately in the name of transparency.
We need these watchdogs digging for the truth. Isaiah Stark’s tragic death was likely preventable, and the adults in this state tasked with protecting children had multiple opportunities to intervene to help Isaiah. Records show his mother repeatedly asked for help, and that there were warning signs missed. It is too late to save Isaiah Stark, but right now, somewhere else in this state, another child is suffering. Public scrutiny of our systems could be what saves that child.
The ombudsman, Stephanie Villafuerte, told Tabachnik, “We have many unanswered questions, and those responsible for giving these answers are unwilling to do so.”
The Child Fatality Review Team praised Grand County and Jefferson County health officials for compiling reports about the familys’ interactions with their human services teams, but concluded in its report: “It was a systemic gap that there was a lack of accountability for the child’s death, which the team believed was needless and could have been prevented, had the child received appropriate monitoring and intervention from the medical and mental health professionals.”
Unacceptable.
We know that the coroner ruled conclusively what had killed Isaiah — hypernatremia or too much sodium in the blood. We wouldn’t even venture to guess at what undiagnosed medical conditions or maltreatment could result in such an unusual death.
But we are horrified that the public officials in positions of power have failed to do the basic investigative work required to find out what happened in the days and weeks leading up to Isaiah’s death.
We call for three basic things to happen in response to what the public now knows about Isaiah’s death:
First, Schroetlin can release all records his department holds related to the investigation, including body-worn camera footage of interviews.
Second, lawmakers can undo a horrible mistake they made in 2018 when they shielded children’s autopsy reports from the Colorado law requiring records to be open for public scrutiny. As we noted at the time, Senate Bill 223 prevents public scrutiny of questionable child deaths. The Post has used child autopsy reports historically to cover the lapses in our child welfare systems that can result in child deaths.
Third, the findings by the Child Fatality Review Board should be heeded and changes made. According to the report, “The team identified a systemic gap in services when the family decided to cease all services as soon as the child’s adoption was finalized. This created a scenario where there were no longer professionals watching out for the child. Prior to the finalization of the adoption, the family had the option to access family therapy and other family preservation services.” The Colorado Department of Human Services and lawmakers can make more resources available to ensure that children are still getting care and review even after their adoption. Known as post-permanency services, adoptive parents and adopted children, even in the most stable home environments, benefit from additional contact with professionals and experts. Especially in rural parts of the state, that contact can be difficult to obtain or cost-prohibitive.
Colorado officials failed Isaiah both before and after his death, but taking these three small steps will help make amends.
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Originally Published: May 21, 2025 at 8:34 AM MDT
