Bullet-proof Visitation

March 23, 2008 permalink

Here is a case we will be hearing a lot more about. Florida mother Celeste Grace Minardi was visiting her son, named in later reports as Bradley Driscoll, at a psychiatrist's office and stabbed him, leaving him critically wounded. This one rare event by a disturbed mother could well become the pretext for the construction of visitation facilities in which parents and children are separated by bullet-proof glass.

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Aunt: Mom Who Stabbed Son Also Threatened Family

Special To TBO.com by EAMONN KNEESHAW
Celeste Grace Minardi is placed into the back of a Largo Police Department cruiser.

By NEIL JOHNSON of The Tampa Tribune

Published: March 23, 2008

The aunt of a boy police say was stabbed and slashed by his mother in a psychiatry office Saturday told a judge this morning that Celeste Grace Minardi has threatened other family members before.

Jacqi Yeager also said during the mother's first appearance hearing Sunday in Pinellas County that family members were afraid of Minardi.

Celeste Grace Minardi

On Saturday morning, Minardi, 55, was in a court-ordered visit with her 15-year-old son at a psychiatry office on Seminole Boulevard in Largo when she pulled a pair of knives from a purse and began hacking at her son, Largo police said.

The boy was stabbed in the abdomen, severely injuring his intestines. In addition he had a pair of slashes across the throat, one 8 inches long, another 3 inches long. The boy also had a 4-inch gash over his right eye.

Police said Minardi, after giving the boy a deck of cards and bottle of cologne, pulled a 15 1/2 inch decorative dagger and 12-inch drywall knife from her purse and attacked her son.

The boy was taken to St. Petersburg's Bayfront Medical Center and was in critical condition after emergency surgery, said Largo police Sgt. Mark Young. The family asked that further details of his condition not be released, the hospital said.

Mirandi, of 1202 Fairway Dr., had been visiting her son at the office about twice a month for the past three years, Young said. The boy's father has custody.

Police did not release the boy's name.

Minardi is the ex-wife of Timothy Driscoll, 47, a bankruptcy lawyer in St. Petersburg. Court records show they filed for divorce in 2004 and had one child together.

Minardi has no criminal record and has never shown any violent behavior, Young said.

This visit did not appear to be different, he said. The mother and son were sitting on a couch. A nurse was about six feet away.

After the attack, the boy tried to run away but collapsed. A doctor ordered Minardi to drop the knives, pulled her from the scene and secured the knives, the sergeant said.

Young said that when police arrived, the teen was covered in blood and slipping in and out of consciousness.

"He told me, 'My mom stabbed me,'" Young said. "Then he looks up at me and said, 'I don't ever want to see her again,' and then he passed out."

Minardi would not say why she attacked the boy and would only answer yes or no when asked whether she understood her rights as she was being arrested, Young said.

She was charged with first-degree attempted murder and booked into Pinellas County Jail shortly before noon Saturday, jail records show. Two additional charges of carrying a concealed weapon were pending, Young said.

Source: Tampa Bay Tribune