WILKES-BARRE — Over a year after being accused of failing to take care of her disabled son and starting a fire recklessly, Linasheri D’Onofrio's trial is far from being scheduled.
Lawyers Sidney D. May and Ellen Granahan recently appeared to represent D’Onofrio, 56, taking the place of Attorney Max C. Lubin.
A status meeting on D’Onofrio’s case in front of Luzerne County Judge Joseph F. Sklarosky Jr. on Thursday was postponed as May and Granahan mentioned they recently obtained some, but not all, evidence related to the case.
Sklarosky rescheduled the status meeting for July 11.
D’Onofrio was charged by the Pennsylvania State Police at Wilkes-Barre, Plains Township police, and county detectives on Feb. 15, 2023, with neglect of care of a dependent person and reckless burning, five years after her son, Shain D’Onofrio, was found by Plains Township firefighters putting out a fire at a shed in the Mountain Ridge Mobile Home Park on Feb. 24, 2018.
Shain D’Onofrio, 24, had cerebral palsy and was confined to a wheelchair. D’Onofrio was the caregiver of her son while they lived in the mobile home park.
Court records say D’Onofrio put the body of Shain D’Onofrio in a shed in early September 2017 until the morning of Feb. 24, 2018, when she moved the remains to another shed before setting it on fire.
Investigators claimed D’Onofrio needed to get rid of the remains because she had received an eviction notice two days earlier.
First Assistant District Attorney Anthony Ross alleged that D’Onofrio neglected her son, including missing several medical appointments.
Shain D’Onofrio was severely undernourished and weighed an estimated 83 pounds when he should have weighed 121 pounds, according to prosecutors.
D’Onofrio accused a former live-in boyfriend and a relative of killing her son.
