No doubt many moms enjoyed breakfast in bed, flowers or some chocolaty goodness today in honor of Mother's Day. But, as New Times' blogger/reporter Matt Hendley has extensively documented, not all women deserve such special treatment.
We can think of a few things these women -- some of the worst mothers in the Valley -- deserve, but flowers and chocolate wouldn't be among them.
Unfortunately, it wasn't difficult to compile a list of women accused of horrific abuse, failing to protect their children or killing them:
Jerice Hunter: Charged with first-degree murder in the death of her daughter, 5-year-old Jhessye Shockley. Hunter has served prison time for past abuse of her other children. Police believe that Jhessye was thrown in a Tempe trash can, and her body was likely taken to a landfill.
Laurie Kelly: Sentenced to 30 days jail and four years of probation for giving homeless people beer in exchange for babysitting her 6-year-old daughter.
She told cops she bought beers for random strangers in the park, and asked them to watch her daughter while she went to "make some money" by selling "her body for sexual favors," according to court documents.
Davieanna Blake: Charged with first-degree murder for standing by while Darnell Alvarez beat her 2-year-old son to death with a belt. According to police documents, Blake didn't "intervene because she did not want to upset Darnell any further."
Alvarez and Blake, the child's parents, didn't want to get Child Protective Services involved so left him to die instead of taking him to the hospital, according to court records.
Rickesha Burns: Accused of shoving a vibrator into her 2-year-old son's anus, which had to be surgically removed. She blamed the abuse on an unknown boy in the park, according to police records.
Doctors also found numerous bruises on the boy's anus, hip, and neck.
Nina Koistinen: Charged with first-degree murder for killing her 6-day-old daughter because she "had too many kids already."
According to police reports, Koistinen admitted to smothering the baby girl "because she thought she had too many kids already and she was jealous of the attention" her husband was giving the baby."
Candace Basilio: Admitted to cops that she hurt her 7-week-old son, who was also reportedly abused by Taylor, his father, according to court records.
Doctors examined the baby and found fractures on his skull, ribs, legs and a broken clavicle, according to police reports.
Jennifer Barnes: Pleaded guilty to child-abuse charges after she was accused of shoving feces in her son's mouth and sticking a toothbrush in his anus.
Jutrina Tillman: Pleaded guilty in a 2011 case, in which she was accused of choking her 5-year-old because he was playing with a video game he got for Christmas, and threatening her children with a butcher knife.
Victoria Soliz: Accused of trying to drown her 3-year-old son in a puddle of water. She told police that Jesus told her to do, and later admitted that she used crystal meth as medication, according to court documents.
Jennifer Campos: Sentenced to 10 years in prison earlier this year for giving her son methadone to treat a toothache in 2011.
She and the boy's father, Anthony Casillas, and another woman, Misty Murphy, had given the boy a mixture of purple Kool-Aid and methadone to treat a toothache, police reported.
Phoenix doctors discovered the then-2-year-old boy had overdosed on methadone -- a drug most commonly used to treat heroin addicts -- and also had traces of amphetamine, nicotine, and acetone in his blood, according to court documents.
