Child dies for love to his alcohol-addicted mother

Vladislav Yakovlev, 11, loved his mother very much but he did not like her way of living and chose to die.

Photo: Child dies for love to his alcohol-addicted mother

The boy was a kind and jovial child. Hew knew that it was difficult for his mother, Galina Yakovleva, to bring him up alone without any assistance from the father or anyone else. The boy tried not to cause any troubles to his mother and even forgave her awful alcohol addiction and terrible escapades that the woman allowed being drunk. Vladislav though that his mother was cruel because of her hard fate. Neighbors said that Galina frequently beat the son; in case of his slight disobedience the woman hit the boy’s head against the wall. The boy had to earn money after school to buy some food for him and the mother. But the woman took even this little money away to buy alcohol. When absolutely drunk, Galina sometimes forgot about the son’s existence at all. Once in winter she left the son in their cold house alone, the boy was cold and had no food. It was thanks to neighbors who took care of him that he survived at all.

In spite of the terrible situation at home, Vladislav was a good pupil. Teachers admit that he was a talented boy, he was particularly good at exact sciences. In the library of his native place Vladislav was one of the most frequent readers. The little boy never complained of his hard fate. Only once he told his close friend that he had a chance to do home assignment only at night when his drunken mother fell asleep.

Vladislav dedicated majority of his essays at school to mother. The boy insisted that his mother was the best in the world and confessed he loved her very much. The society could not understand the reason of the boy’s excitement over the alcoholic woman who took no care of him but still nobody could change the situation in the family.

Vladislav’s grandmother made several attempts to officially register guardianship over the boy and to take him to her place. However, officials overseeing guardianship would not let the old woman be a guardian to the boy and said that it was better for him to live with his own mother even if she was addicted to drinks.

One tragic day, neighbors heard the boy cry ‘Mama!’, and then his mother screamed that the son hung himself. Even when dying, the boy cried the word that he always treated the dearest, but it did not touch his mother’s heart. The child was persistently seeking love and care of his mother but the woman was invariably callous.

Hundreds of people living in the city where Vladislav lived came to the boy’s funeral. Majority of them felt sorry that they could not save the boy’s life. Vladislav’s grandmother deeply grieved over the child’s death; the death turned out to be a terrible shock for her. It is awful but the death did not touch at all the boy’s mother as she seemed absolutely insane because of the amount of consumed alcohol.

The municipal court of Kurgan, the city where the tragedy occurred, passed a suspended sentence of a year and a half upon the boy’s mother Galina Yakovleva. The woman was found guilty only of improper parental behavior. The court acquitted her of the charges saying it was the mother who drove the boy to suicide.

Senior Prosecutor in Kurgan Tatyana Gracheva says that children have committed eleven suicidal attempts in the city within the first months of the year. Two of them turned lethal. And it is known that majority of suicidal attempts are caused by family problems. But at the same time the senior prosecutor says that parents found guilty of such problems have never been imprisoned because of their improper parental behavior. ‘The legislation is very easy in this case and it makes sense making it tougher,’ Tatyana Gracheva adds.

Moscow’s Serbsky Social and Forensic Psychiatry Center informs that over 14,000 of underages committed suicide over the past five years in Russia. Every year, about 2,800 children and teenagers aged between 5 and 19 commit suicide every year. At that, 70 percent of suicides are committed by mentally sane children. It is known that majority of suicides committed by children under 10 are caused by cruelty in families where these children are not respected as personalities.

Oksana Anikina

Translated by Maria Gousseva
Pravda.Ru