Father Charged After 13-Month-Old Daughter Dies in Freezing Room
A Maine father whose 13-month-old daughter died in a freezing bedroom last December was arrested last week after a medical examiner determined that the child died from hypothermia, authorities said.
Shane McLaughlin, 37, was charged Wednesday with manslaughter and other offenses following the death of Eleanora Ray McLaughlin, according to the Maine Department of Public Safety.
Details surrounding the girl’s death were not immediately released. However, McLaughlin spoke with NEWS CENTER Maine shortly afterward about what happened at the family’s home in Milford.
He told the station that the room where he and his children were sleeping had been heated with a space heater. After a pet left the door open, he said, the room became so cold that he could see his breath.
“I grabbed a package of Pop-Tarts, opened it up, and I went to wake up Eleanora, and that’s when I found her dead,” McLaughlin told the outlet.
McLaughlin’s estranged wife, Erika Dupuis, later told NEWS CENTER Maine that she was “angry and upset” because her husband had not initially been charged in connection with their daughter’s death.
Dupuis, who moved to West Virginia in the summer of 2025 and left her children behind, said she had hoped prosecutors would bring a manslaughter charge against McLaughlin.
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The couple had previously been investigated by the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, according to Maine State Sen. Jeff Timberlake.
The Republican senator told NEWS CENTER Maine that records he obtained showed authorities had investigated the couple before.
McLaughlin confirmed to the station that he and Dupuis had been investigated several times since 2017, though he disputed the investigators’ findings.
Following his arrest, McLaughlin was taken to the Penobscot County Jail. He is expected to appear in court at the Penobscot Judicial Center.
Information about McLaughlin’s attorney was not immediately available.
Timberlake said the manslaughter charge in Eleanora’s death was “about time.”
“I don’t know what took so long,” he said.
