DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Authorities say a 2-year-old child died in Des Moines after ingesting a woman’s prescription medications. A Des Moines police news release says 38-year-old Amanda Leonard-Helum was arrested Tuesday in Waterloo on a warrant for child endangerment causing death. She was taken to Polk County Jail and remained there Wednesday, pending $25,000 bail.

Police say Leonard-Helum, of Waterloo, was trying to adopt the little boy, who was a child of her former boyfriend. She’d driven herself and the boy to Des Moines from Waterloo on June 26.
She learned after they arrived that the child had swallowed some of her medications. Police say she decided to monitor him rather than seek medical care. He died overnight. Toxicology reports indicate he died of an overdose of her medicines.