PADUCAH, KY—A Ft. Campbell military base resident was sentenced in U.S. District Court today by Senior Judge Thomas B. Russell to forty-one months’ imprisonment, followed by a three-year term of supervised release, for wantonly abusing her child, who at the time was under the age of 12, announced David J. Hale, United States Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky.

Shanika D’June Pickens, a/k/a Shanika Campbell, age 28, previously pleaded guilty to a two count Indictment charging that she wantonly abused the child by failing to provide the child professional medical attention for burns and for failing to provide the child adequate food and nutrition that resulted in his medical diagnosis of malnutrition.

Campbell had custody of her 3 children, including the victim in this case, known as K.V.P., who was under 12 years of age, while living on Ft. Campbell, Kentucky military base, located in Christian County, Kentucky. Between January 1, 2011 and September 30, 2011, the victim received burns to his right side and back areas. At that time, Campbell was aware of the burns and did not seek professional medical attention that was available on Ft. Campbell military base for her family. Campbell admitted that her failure to seek medical attention for the burns was wanton because she was aware of and consciously disregarded a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the child would suffer a serious bodily condition and ultimately experienced more pain and scarring to his back and right side areas than he would have experienced had he received timely and competent medical attention. The risk of that harm to K.V.P. was of such a nature and degree that the disregard of that risk constituted a gross deviation from the standard of conduct that a reasonable person would observe in the situation.

Further, between October 1, 2011 and January 30, 2012, Campbell failed to provide adequate food and nutrition to K.V.P. That condition resulted in his hospitalization at Vanderbilt University Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee, between January 28, 2012 and February 6, 2012. During that time, the minor victim was diagnosed with, among other conditions, malnutrition. Campbell admitted that her failure to provide adequate food and nutrition to K.V.P was wanton because she was aware of and consciously disregarded a substantial and unjustifiable risk that constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of conduct that a reasonable person would observe in the situation.

If convicted at trial, Campbell faced a sentence of no more than 10 years in prison, a fine of $500,000 and a three year period of supervised release.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney David Sparks and was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Ft. Campbell, Kentucky, 502nd Military Police Battalion (CID).