The trial of Sini Mathews, the Indian-American adoptive mother of Sherin Mathews, the three-year-old who was found dead in a culvert in Dallas in October 2017, was postponed by a court in Dallas, USA, according to news organisation NBC DFW.
According to the report, the date of the trial is being pushed as new prosecutors are being assigned to the case. A new date has not been set yet. The bail amount for Sini may be reduced at a hearing to be held on Friday morning, reported Dallas News. Arrested in November 2017, Sini’s bail at the time was set for $250,000.
Sini and her husband Wesley, who are natives of Kerala, adopted Sherin from an orphanage in Bihar in July 2016. Sherin disappeared on October 7, 2017, and Wesley initially claimed that he had sent her out in the wee hours of the morning as punishment for not drinking her milk. On October 22, 2017, Sherin’s body was recovered from a culvert under a road about a kilometre from the Mathews’ home. The cause of Sherin’s death could not be investigated as the body was decomposed.
Wesley later changed his version, claiming that when he tried to feed her, Sherin had choked on her milk. He also admitted that the family had gone out to dinner and left Sherin behind, a day before she died.
Wesley was indicted for capital murder by a grand jury and for tampering with evidence. Sini was charged with endangering a child.
Sini and Wesley gave up the parental rights of their biological daughter, aged 4, in January 2018. The daughter has since been with Social Services.
An autopsy report in January 2018 showed that Sherin died of homicidal violence. During a Child Protective Services (CPS) hearing, a doctor had testified that Sherin had multiple injuries on her body months before she went missing.
In September last year, the Indian government decided to revoke the Overseas Citizenship of India (OCI) for Wesley and Sini. OCI is an immigration status that allows a foreign citizen of Indian origin to come back to India and live and work here permanently.