Dad of teen who OD’d to be released from jail
Objectors say he watched boy suffer out of fear of being arrested.
A man who reportedly did nothing for hours while his 13-year-old son died had his bond reduced in a different case.
The father of a teen who died of a suspected overdose, who prosecutors allege “did nothing for hours, and hours, as his son’s breathing became more labored,” had his bond reduced on a different case Wednesday and was expected to be released from jail.
Robert Wylie, 40, was living in an RV in “deplorable conditions” that was “covered with trash and littered with used drug paraphernalia,” according to a Montgomery County Prosecutor’s Office memorandum opposed to Wylie’s
motion for a reduction in bond.
Montgomer y Co u nt y Common Pleas Court Judge Steven Dankof ruled Wednesday afternoon t hat Wylie’s bond should be reduced from $100,000 in a December 2016 case to his own recognizance with electronic home monitoring and weekly urinalysis tests.
Nathan Wylie, 13, died April 1 after being found unresponsive on March 28 when his father took him to a nearby Dayton Fire Station on South Broadway Street, according to police reports.
The Montgomery County Coroner’s Office ruled Nathan died of an “anoxic brain injury” due to suspected drug intoxication, but no drug could be identified.
Wylie was charged Aug. 4 with child endangering and weapons
under disability, both third-degree felonies, and given a bond of $10,000 in the case involving his son.
Montgomery County Prosecutor Mat Heck Jr. said there was “insufficient evidence to determine where or from whom the child obtained any drugs and,
therefore, homicide charges could not be brought.” Wylie’s attorney sought a reduc
tion in his client’s bond stemming from the 2016 case in which Wylie was found with drugs during a
traffic stop of his girlfriend. Wylie, who has been incarcerated since March 28, had a status conference scheduled for Wednesday postponed until Aug. 30.
“(The) Defendant is a lifelong Dayton resident, has extended family in the area, and has never failed to appear for court in any case,” wrote Jeffrey Gramza, Wylie’s new attorney. “He has completely detoxed and would test negative for any substance abuse.”
Gramza wrote that Wylie will stay with his brother and be on electronic monitoring (EHDP).
In response to Gramza’s motion, assistant prosecutor Lynda Dodd wrote she objected to any reduction in Wylie’s bond, calling him a flight risk.
Dodd wrote that on March 28, 2017, Wylie had custody of both of his sons but didn’t know where one was located while Wylie was in “the clenches of drug addiction.”
The memo said Wylie had once been resuscitated with Narcan after overdosing. The memo also said on that day in March, Wylie entered his RV and saw his son unconscious with what he thought was paper used to snort drugs.
“Believing his son was overdosing, he did nothing for hours, and hours, as his son’s breathing became more labored,” Dodd wrote. “As time went on, the child’s brain was being deprived of oxygen and brain injury was increasing.”
Dodd said Wylie knew he had a warrant for his arrest and “if he called for help for (his) son, or if he had even bothered to go next door to the fire station, he would be facing arrest — and thus be deprived of feeding his addiction. Thus, for hours and hours he did nothing.”
Dodd wrote that the same family seeking to support Wylie was “not successfully supporting him or his sons previously”.
In opposing any reduction in bail, Dodd wrote that if Wylie’s addiction is so strong that in March he would “ignore his son’s declining, and ultimately fatal, medical distress to avoid such arrest — there is no condition that the Court could place on Defendant on EHDP that would ensure his return to court.”