Mother of starved girl allowed to leave AMHI

AUGUSTA – A woman who reportedly told police a decade ago she starved her 5-year-old daughter in their Bangor apartment because the child was evil has sufficiently recovered from her mental illness to live in a 24-hour supervised apartment, doctors told a judge Friday in Kennebec County Superior Court.

Justice John Atwood said he will allow Tonia Porter to move from a supervised group home to an apartment in a building where staff will be present around the clock.

He added conditions suggested by Dr. Ann LeBlanc, a psychologist who heads the state’s forensic service, that include having Porter check with staff at the beginning and end of each day and engage in 15 to 20 hours of work- or vocation-related activities each week.

Dr. Muriel Sugarman said Porter is in remission from her schizophrenia.

Porter, 38, formerly of Bangor, was committed to the Augusta Mental Health Institute in the spring of 1995 after being found innocent by reason of insanity in the November 1993 death of her daughter, Tavielle Kigas.