SKOWHEGAN – Jennifer Pillsbury, the 29-year-old Skowhegan woman who was convicted of child endangerment last April after her son died in 1998 while sleeping in an overheated car, is being sued for wrongful death by the child’s father.

Scott Macdonald of Davenport, Iowa, maintains in the civil suit, filed in Somerset County Superior Court, that since Pillsbury was found guilty of endangering 2-year-old Robert Duncan Macdonald, she is responsible, at least in civil court, for his death.

Pillsbury’s attorney, however, maintains in court documents that since Pillsbury was acquitted of manslaughter in the criminal case against her, “she has not been found criminally liable for the death of her son.”

Robert Macdonald died about 6 a.m. Aug. 29, 1998, after he was placed in a running car, with the heater turned on against a chilly morning, at a home that Pillsbury was visiting in Skowhegan. After tucking a blanket around her child, Pillsbury testified in subsequent court hearings, she went back into the home for two to three hours, returning to find her son near death.

She was originally charged with reckless or criminally negligent manslaughter and child endangerment.

After a jury-waived trial before Justice Kirk Studstrup, during which evidence was presented to show that the car’s heater malfunctioned, causing temperatures in the vehicle to rise to 200 to 210 degrees.

Pillsbury was acquitted of manslaughter and found guilty of endangerment.

At her sentencing in June, she was given a nine-month suspended jail sentence and one year’s probation.

She was also required to complete 120 hours of community service.

In making his ruling, Studstrup determined that Pillsbury made a mistake in judgment but could not have foreseen that her actions would cause his death.

During her trial, Pillsbury testified that Macdonald had been abusive to her and had not been a part of her son’s life. At the time of the child’s death, Pillsbury was a single parent, attending Central Maine Technical College in Lewiston.

In the civil suit, however, Macdonald’s attorney, Michael Waxman of Portland, maintained that he needs to prove three things in order to prevail in civil court, where the standard of proof is lower than that in criminal court.

The three points are: that Pillsbury owed a duty of care to Robert Macdonald; that she breached this duty by act or omission; and that her breach of duty caused harm to the child.

Waxman asked the court for an immediate ruling on the case after Pillsbury, who initially was acting as her own attorney, failed to file a response to the court regarding the justice’s summary judgment within a specific time.

A ruling was initially made in favor of Macdonald, based on Pillsbury’s failure to respond, but her newly hired attorney, David P. Very of Portland, appealed to Justice Ellen Gorman for more time. The judgment was vacated and set aside in late November.

Very and Pillsbury were then given until Jan. 1 to respond to Macdonald’s request for an immediate judgment.

In his earlier appeal to the court for more time, Very wrote: “It is clear that there can be no greater stigma than a judgment holding a mother responsible for the death of her child.”

In her initial response to the actual lawsuit in October, Pillsbury denied that she was responsible for her son’s death, admitting that he had died of hyperthermia.