Amanda Hamm is the Illinois mother whose three young children drowned in Clinton Lake in DeWitt County on September 2, 2003, after the car they were in rolled into the water. A jury acquitted her of murder but convicted her of child endangerment, and she served just under five years. Her then-boyfriend, Maurice LaGrone Jr., was convicted of first-degree murder for the same incident and sentenced to life without parole.
What Happened at Clinton Lake
Hamm, then 27, called 911 from Clinton Lake to report that a car had rolled into the water with her three children inside. Rescuers arrived within about five minutes and found the rear of a 1997 Oldsmobile Cutlass submerged in roughly four and a half feet of water. Hamm and LaGrone, 28, were standing on the shore. The three children were pulled from the back seat but could not be revived.
The victims were Christopher Hamm, 6; Austin Brown, 3; and Kyleigh Hamm, 23 months. All three were Amanda Hamm’s children.
DeWitt County Sheriff Roger Massey initially treated the deaths as an accident. Within two weeks, investigators had shifted to a criminal inquiry. They concluded drugs and alcohol were not factors, ruled out life insurance as a motive, and confirmed the couple had not been launching or retrieving a boat.
The Charges
A grand jury indicted both Hamm and LaGrone on nine counts of first-degree murder, with aggravating factors that initially made both eligible for the death penalty. LaGrone was arrested at a motel near the St. Louis airport; Hamm was arrested in Bloomington, Illinois. Both were held on $5 million bond.
The local prosecutor recused himself because Hamm’s mother, Ann Danison, worked as a secretary in the DeWitt County State’s Attorney’s office. Special prosecutors Roger Simpson and Ed Parkinson were appointed to handle the case. In January 2004, the prosecution announced it would not seek the death penalty. Sheriff Massey acknowledged the case “qualified” for capital punishment but called execution a “remote possibility” given recent trends in Illinois.
Two Trials, Two Very Different Verdicts
LaGrone was tried first, in May 2006, with the trial moved about 25 miles north to Bloomington because of pretrial publicity. Prosecutors argued that the couple had planned the drownings because the children “didn’t fit in with the couple’s lifestyle” and were “in the way of the life the couple wanted to live as college students in St. Louis.” They also introduced statements Hamm had allegedly made to investigators claiming LaGrone planned the killings.
LaGrone testified that the deaths were accidental. He said he had driven toward the boat ramp intending to tease the children and that the car rolled into the lake because of poor judgment in where he parked and his subsequent panic. Accident reconstruction was tested by both sides. While the car could roll forward when left in reverse, the prosecution’s testing showed a driver could easily stop it by applying the brake, undercutting LaGrone’s account. Jurors later said his lack of emotion on the stand worked against him.
After three and a half days of deliberation, the jury convicted LaGrone on all nine counts of first-degree murder. In a separate sentencing phase, the jury did not unanimously find him eligible for the death penalty; two jurors said prosecutors had failed to prove he specifically intended for the children to die. On April 12, 2006, Judge Stephen H. Peters sentenced him to life in prison without the possibility of release.
Hamm faced identical charges but was tried separately. Her lead defense attorney, Steven Skelton, persuaded the judge to allow jurors to consider child endangerment as a lesser charge alongside murder. In 2006, a McLean County jury acquitted her of all nine murder counts and convicted her only of child endangerment. In February 2007, the judge imposed a 10-year prison sentence, half the potential maximum for that offense.
The split verdict became a flashpoint. Prosecutors had said Hamm was in the car and aware of the plan, yet LaGrone received life for murder while she was convicted only of endangerment. The children’s fathers and their families were angry, and residents of Clinton, a town of about 2,500, questioned how two people involved in the same incident could receive such different punishments.
Release From Prison
Hamm was released from Dwight Correctional Center on September 9, 2008, having served just under five years total: more than three years in jail awaiting trial and roughly one year and seven months after her conviction. As a condition of parole, she was required to undergo mental health counseling and meet with drug and alcohol abuse counselors. She was reported to be heading to a halfway house in Chicago.
Life After Prison and Losing Three More Children
After her release, Hamm married Leo Ware, took his name, and had three more children, two boys and a girl. The family lived in the Chicago area under the name Amanda Ware. In 2014, authorities removed all three children from the home after a doctor recognized her as the woman formerly known as Amanda Hamm. The children were placed with Leo Ware’s sister.
On November 6, 2015, Cook County Circuit Judge Demetrios Kottaras ruled that Amanda Ware was an “abusive and neglectful parent.” The judge invoked the doctrine of “anticipatory neglect,” which allows courts to intervene before a child is physically harmed when a parent has a documented history of endangering children. “We do not have to wait for the injuries,” the judge stated. Beyond her criminal history, the court cited untreated mental illness, a history of drug and alcohol abuse, failure to maintain mental health treatment, and evidence of domestic violence involving Leo Ware, including a 2012 police response and a 2013 protective order related to his crack cocaine use.
In June 2016, Judge Kottaras ruled again that both Amanda and Leo Ware remained “unable to parent” their children, and the children stayed in foster care. A parental capacity assessment described Amanda Ware as a “very conscientious and patient mother,” while flagging concerns about Leo Ware’s drug relapse and prior gang involvement. Supervised visits were allowed, with permanency hearings every six months.
On February 20, 2018, the parties reached an agreement placing custody of the three children with a guardian, a member of Leo Ware’s family in Chicago. Under the terms, Amanda Ware would not regain custody. Both parents retained visitation rights, but the children would remain permanently outside their home.
Where Maurice LaGrone Is Now
LaGrone’s direct appeal was affirmed by the Illinois Appellate Court, Fourth District, on January 28, 2008, and the Illinois Supreme Court denied his petition for leave to appeal on May 28, 2008. A later postconviction petition, arguing his trial attorney should have requested a jury instruction on child endangerment as a lesser included offense, was dismissed in 2010 and that dismissal was affirmed in 2011. As of mid-2026, LaGrone remains incarcerated at Graham Correctional Center in Illinois, serving a life sentence with no projected discharge date, according to Illinois Department of Corrections records.