The trial continued Tuesday for ex-NYPD officer Michael Valva, charged in the death of his 8-year-old son Thomas Valva, who froze to death in his Center Moriches garage in 2020. In the opening remarks, Suffolk prosecutors called Michael Valva a “depraved father who exiled his sons to die in the garage.” Outraged neighbors showed up at the trial, “demanding justice” for the boy.
Valva, along with his then-fiancé Angela Pollina, who will have a separate trial, were arrested Jan. 17, 2020, and charged with second-degree murder and four counts of endangering the welfare of a child. If convicted, each faces 25 years to life in prison. Both have pleaded not guilty and remain jailed without bail.
On the night that Valva and Pollina left Thomas and his brother in the garage, it was 19 degrees. The boys, who both have autism, were forced to sleep on a cold floor with no mattress, no pillow, no blankets, where they had lived for month. During opening arguments, Assistant District Attorney Laura Newcomb added, “Just his body on the cold concrete all night long.”
Thomas died a few hours later of hypothermia, according to the Suffolk County Medical Office’s determination. His body temperature was 76.1 degrees, 22 degrees lower than it should have been, prosecutors said.
Now the East Moriches Elementary School Principal Edward Schneyer is providing additional information, stating that in the months before Thomas died, a worsening situation evolved that had teachers and others at the district “flooding” the Child Protective Services hot line in Albany with cries for help.
Schneyer also discussed a history of protection orders, including one against Michael Valva, ordering him to refrain from corporal punishment and undergo a parenting skills class, which he took once for less than two hours before saying it wasn’t needed, Schneyer said. He mentioned that the boys were hungry and the father had refused to fill out forms to have them enrolled in the school lunch program.
More deterioration occurred during the summer. When school reopened that year, 2018, Thomas’ older brother was “extremely emaciated, his face was bony, his arms; he was thin, frail,” and had lost 20 pounds since the physical in the summer of 2017.
Thomas had lost weight, too, but his brother’s condition was more noticeably alarming, he said. When questioned by the Principal, Valva told him that the boys had lost control of their bowels and were urinating and defecating all around the house — and now came to school in pullups. “That was a huge surprise,” Schneyer said, since both boys had been potty-trained when they enrolled in the district. The boys were frequently cold to the touch and wore their coats indoors, saying they were cold.
“We had major, major concerns when the boys returned to school,” he said. Then Thomas started showing up at school with “suspicious bruises, and a history of abuse” and another report was made to CPS.
Despite all these warning signals and repeated reports filed, Thomas Valva died on January 17, 2020 at the age of 8. The question is, how and why did the system fail these two boys?
