Sep 12, 2025 By Garrett Neese 6 min read

After the death of a Fayette County 9-year-old last week, state legislators are proposing legislation that would enact stricter regulations for parents entering the foster care system, stronger oversight and stiffer penalties for harming children.

State Reps. Charity Grimm Krupa, R-Fayette, and Ryan Warner, R-Fayette/Westmoreland, said they would be introducing bills in the coming days aimed at addressing systemic failings that may have contributed to the death of Renesmay Eutsey and in other cases of abuse.

Sarah Shipley, 35, and Kourtney Eutsey, 31, of Dunbar, face charges in the death of Renesmay, whose body was found partially submerged in the Youghiogheny River in the early morning hours of Sept. 4.

On Monday, they received additional charges related to the abuse and neglect of a 6-year-old boy who doctors found to be badly malnourished, and an 11-year-old girl at the home who said she suffered repeated physical abuse at the hands of the parents.

Fayette County District Attorney Mike Aubele said Wednesday that while he wouldn’t comment specifically on the bills, he was pleased to see legislation being brought forward to address the problem.

“I certainly appreciate that this case has not only brought the community out, but also our lawmakers trying to take reasonable steps to ensure that something like this never happens again,” he said.

Renesmay had been placed in kinship care with Shipley, a relative of her biological mother, Aubele said. The other four children, ages 2 to 11, also appear to have been related, Aubele said.

“Based on everything I’ve been told and I’ve seen, the biological parents were incapable of caring for these children, and were left with an option to either give them to another family member or to have them somehow placed in the system,” he said.

In kinship care, there are at least 30 days of checks, court involvement and a review by a third-party foster care agency before the court closes the case, Aubele said. After that, the children are in the custody and care of the relative.

The last time any of the children in the house had been under the umbrella of Children and Youth Services was probably sometime in 2024, Aubele said. For Renesmay, that may have been as far back as 2019.

Warner and Grimm Krupa could not be reached for comment on the proposed bills Wednesday or Thursday.

In a release posted on the state House website Wednesday, Warner announced he was seeking co-sponsors for a bill he is calling Renesmay’s Law, which would revamp the state’s CYS system.

“While no law can eliminate evil, we have a duty to ensure that the systems designed to protect children are as strong and responsive as possible,” Warner said in the release.

Provisions would include increasing accountability and oversight of county CYS agencies; strengthening recordkeeping, case history and in-home oversight; improving caseworker support and workload management; enhancing training and coordination among available services; and expanding reporting and response requirements.

Warner said he is also working on expanding criminal penalties for extreme cases of child abuse and child sexual abuse, up to and including the death penalty.

On Tuesday, Warner also reintroduced a bill that would establish child torture as a crime in Pennsylvania. He had previously submitted the bill last year.

It would make child torture a third-degree felony punishable by seven years in prison if the child is not physically assaulted; if they are, it becomes a first-degree felony with a maximum sentence of 20 years.

Pennsylvania is one of about a dozen states in the country that does not have such a measure on the books, he said in a memo announcing the bill.

The bill was referred to the Judiciary Committee. It has seven co-sponsors, including Grimm Krupa and Rep. Bud Cook, R-Greene.

Grimm Krupa said in a release Tuesday she will propose four bills aimed at providing greater oversight and more protection for children.

The first bill would require all applicants for foster or kinship parenting to undergo mental health screening, according to a memo Krupa’s office circulated to fellow House members Tuesday. If concerns about a parent’s mental health are reported, agencies would be required to perform new evaluations.

Kinship applicants could get provisional approval, but would have to complete the screening within a “reasonable timeframe.”

Grimm Krupa based the requirements on similar requirements in Missouri.

“The trauma foster children carry into care requires a stable, healthy, and safe environment,” she said in the memo. “By requiring psychological screening and physician attestation, we can reduce the risks of secondary trauma, placement disruptions, and potential harm. This legislation will bring Pennsylvania’s standards in line with best practices and help ensure that our foster system prioritizes child safety at every level.”

A second bill would require children to attend a public school or a licensed private school, unless a Court of Common Pleas judge rules the child can be homeschooled.

The 11-year-old girl in Shipley and Eutsey’s home told investigators she had asked to attend school, only to be told they didn’t want her to be educated, according to court records.

Another bill would strengthen penalties for child abuse, adding an aggravating factor for parents, guardians or caregivers.

In her memo, Grimm Krupa said this was also motivated by other recent local child abuse cases, such as the Redstone Township parents recently accused of keeping their children locked in conditions police described as a “dungeon.”

The last bill would create an independent agency to investigate complaints about child welfare agencies, now handled by the state Department of Human Services.

Fayette County Children and Youth Services did not respond to a request for comment on the Warner and Grimm Krupa’s bills.

After a suspicious death of a child in the foster system, a mandatory meeting takes place within 30 days, Aubele said. Every agency involved, from first responders to police, goes over the response to the case and its history to see what happened and where the response could be improved.

“I don’t know that we’re ever as a society going to be able to take every measure possible to prevent something like this from happening,” Aubele said. “It’s just not possible. These are intentional acts by criminals. But we will always, always look for ways to improve. If there is something we can do, we will do it.”