Wynita Everette DaleSALISBURY, Md.- A Salisbury woman accused of placing her toddler son in scalding bathwater has pleaded guilty to first-degree child abuse.
Twenty-five-year-old Wynita Everette Dale was to go on trial in Wicomico County Circuit Court on Tuesday, but chose to take a plea deal instead.
Prosecutors said that back in June, Dale placed her 3-year-old son in bathtub full of scalding water as punishment for a potty training incident. The child, who sustained second-degree burns to the lower half of his body, initially treated at Peninsula Regional Medical Center in Salisbury. His skin was so badly blistered that he had to be transported to the Johns Hopkins Burn Center in Baltimore.
AFter her arrest, Dale told investigators she placed her son in the hot water because her mother had told her to do so. That woman, 45-year-old Joanne Evette Gale, also of Salisbury, was convicted earlier this month of two counts of first-degree child abuse and related offenses.
Both women are being held in the Wicomico County Detention Center where they are awaiting sentencing.
