Legislators Call for Stiffer Penalties for Child Murderers

In the wake of the slaying of 7-year-old Nixzmary Brown, state legislators yesterday called for stiffer penalties for child murderers and demanded the reform of the Administration for Children's Services.

"What happened to little Nixzmary Brown is an abomination," Assemblywoman Naomi Rivera said at a news conference in the Bronx. "I am not sure who is to be held more at fault - her parents, whose repeated abuse of their own daughter is a reprehensible crime beyond belief, or the Administration for Children's Services, whose inability to adequately perform their duties directly led to Nixzmary's death."

Ms. Rivera said Governor Pataki was "passionate and extremely dedicated" to enacting tougher penalties for assaulting or killing a police officer. "We went to Albany and did that because it was the right thing to do. Now we want to see the governor to be just as steadfast in protecting our children," she said.

She called for the same penalties for child abusers as those the governor secured for people who attack police officers. She said she does not support the death penalty. "That is too easy," she said. "I want him to rot in a cell with an abuser the way he was."

Ms. Rivera said Nixzmary was not the first child who had been through the child welfare system to be killed by his or her parents. She cited four examples since 1995, including the widely publicized case of Rayvon Evans, an infant whose parents through his body out a window when the police arrived to investigate.

Assemblywoman Carmen Arroyo and state Senator Efrain Gonzalez Jr. joined Ms. Rivera at the conference, as did more than a dozen activists and community members. All three legislators are Democrats of the Bronx.

"When you have to enter into city agencies, and you have to enter into the bureaucracy, you are going to be lost," Ms. Arroyo said. She added that the agency's ineffectiveness was a waste of taxpayer's money and suggested that the police take a more active role in child welfare. Mr. Gonzalez said he could not accept the argument that the city does not have enough resources to fund the children's services agency adequately. As details of Nixzmary's case emerged, child welfare officials admitted the system had failed her, and launched an immediate review of thousands of other cases citywide, the Associated Press reported on Friday.

The commissioner of the Administration for Children's Services, John Mattingly, said the agency should have obtained a court order to enter the home, the AP reported. "We were in a position to have kept this from happening, and that did not happen," Mr. Mattingly said.

Other legislators said the agency must be reformed. Ms. Rivera said she met yesterday with the City Council's Bronx delegation, members of which said they would call on the mayor to act.

Senator Schumer yesterday said at a news conference: "There has to be reform in the system. There's no question. The mayor says that. Everybody says it. Whatever we can do to help the city federally reform, we certainly would do."