Maine Father Charged with Manslaughter in Toddler's Freezing Death
Shane McLaughlin faces charges nearly a year after his 13-month-old daughter Eleanora died of hypothermia.
A Maine father has been charged with manslaughter and three counts of child endangerment in connection with the death of his 13-month-old daughter, Eleanora, who was found dead in December 2025. Shane McLaughlin, 37, was arrested Wednesday, nearly a year after the incident.
The Maine State Police Department stated that the Medical Examiner's Office had ruled Eleanora's cause of death as hypothermia, determining the manner of death to be accidental. However, investigators later uncovered evidence that led to McLaughlin's arrest.
In a television interview following his daughter's death, McLaughlin described the room where his children slept as being so cold that he "could see my breath." He recounted finding Eleanora unresponsive after attempting to wake her. "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," he told WCSH, a local NBC affiliate. He stated he had been using an electric space heater in the bedroom.
Eleanora's mother, Erika, who was estranged from McLaughlin and living in West Virginia, expressed anger and upset that he had not been charged earlier. She told WCSH in April that their three children, including Eleanora and her twin sibling, were living with McLaughlin in Maine. According to Erika, state officials informed her that Eleanora was found in bed covered in urine.
Erika described Eleanora as a happy child who was learning to walk. Before Eleanora's death, McLaughlin's Facebook profile biography read, "Father of 3 beautiful kids my family will always come first no matter the cost!!" He had also shared a story about another child found dead in Maine, calling the incident "sickening."
The couple's two surviving children have been in the custody of Erika's grandmother since the investigation began. State Senator Jeff Timberlake had previously called for improved investigative standards in child deaths, noting in a letter to the Maine Department of Health and Human Services that Eleanora had allegedly been living "in a home alongside her siblings with no heat and no running water in the middle of a Maine winter."
McLaughlin is being held at the Penobscot County Jail on $250,000 bail and is scheduled to appear in court on Friday. He has not yet entered a plea, and it is unclear if he has legal representation.