Mom arrested in 4-year-old son’s death 11 years after he was found dead in Coral Springs apartment

More than 11 years after a 4-year-old boy was found dead in a Coral Springs apartment, his mother has been arrested and accused of his murder.

Destene Simmons, 34, was booked Friday into the North Broward Bureau on one count of first-degree murder and one count of aggravated child abuse in her son Antwan Hope Jr.’s death. Port St. Lucie Police Department helped with the arrest, though Coral Springs Police in a news release Monday did not say when she was initially arrested.

Just days after Antwan was found dead on June 10, 2013, Coral Springs Police considered Simmons a person of interest. The police department did not elaborate in its news release on why the arrest came more than a decade later and denied releasing the warrant for Simmons’ arrest, citing an ongoing investigation.

Simmons, who was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and depression, was having her first unsupervised visit with Antwan at her apartment in Coral Springs since she allegedly attempted to suffocate him in 2011. In three cryptic 911 calls that morning, Simmons asked for help without giving her address and without saying why she was calling.

“I just want someone to come out,” Simmons told a 911 operator. In a later call, Simmons gave her address in the 9000 block of Northwest 28th Drive, saying only, “My baby don’t want to come out,” before hanging up.

Officers discovered Antwan’s body on a bed, still in his pajamas, inside the apartment. Police immediately considered the death suspicious, and Simmons was hospitalized and had a psychological evaluation.

The police department has released few details publicly about Antwan’s death and their investigation since, including his cause and manner of death. Court records in the case were not available Monday night.

Antwan’s father, Antwan Hope Sr., filed a negligence lawsuit against the Department of Children and Families and ChildNet, a contractor of the department, on the one-year anniversary of his son’s death, alleging Simmons killed him or that he died “as a result of severe neglect due to her mental incapacity to properly care” for him. He alleged DCF and ChildNet were negligent by allowing Simmons’s visit despite her allegedly attempting to suffocate him.

The lawsuit also alleged Simmons “would regularly take Antwan Hope Jr. from his residence and walk around in the streets with him at 3 a.m. in the morning” and refused others to interact with him. Court records in the lawsuit are no longer accessible.

Former Broward Judge Elizabeth Scherer lambasted the child protection agencies in court a few days after Antwan’s death and said that a court order was violated in allowing Simmons to visit her son unsupervised. Scherer was supposed to review a home study before Simmons could have unsupervised visits, which was not filed until the day after Antwan died.

“The system has failed you, and I’m sorry,” Scherer told Hope Sr. and his relatives in court at the time.

Information from the Sun Sentinel archives was used in this report.

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