Funds being raised for Jeffrey Baldwin bronze statue
Posted November 28, 2013 9:34 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
An Ottawa-area man has started an online fundraising campaign to raise money for a bronze statue of Jeffrey Baldwin, the Toronto boy who died after immense abuse at the hands of his grandparents.
Todd Boyce of Carleton Place, who wasn’t immediately available for comment, said on the Indiegogo website that his goal was to raise $25,000 to erect a life-size bronze statue at Toronto’s Greenwood Park of Jeffrey wearing his Superman outfit.
The campaign, which was launched Nov. 22 and ends on Jan 21, 2014, has raised $1,175.
“It will be a symbol for everyone about how important it is to be diligent about reporting suspected instances of child abuse to prevent another needless death such as Jeffrey’s,” Boyce said on Indiegogo.
Jeffrey died at the age of five in 2002 of septic shock from malnutrition and bacterial pneumonia after enduring years of abuse by his grandparents.
Elva Bottineau and Norman Kidman of Toronto were convicted in 2006 and are currently serving life sentences for second-degree murder in the boy’s death.
A coroner’s inquest into Jeffrey’s death, which began in September and is hearing final arguments this week, learned that the Catholic Children’s Aid Society placed the boy and his three siblings with their grandparents without checking its own files on them, which would have shown they abused their own children, including Jeffery’s mother.
A memorial dedicated to Jeffrey already exists at Greenwood Park, which is near Woodfield Road, where the boy once lived.
With files from The Canadian Press
