The prosecution against Elizabeth Dubois expanded after Austin Raymond died, setting up years of litigation before a life sentence.
LAPEER, Mich. — Elizabeth Dubois’ life sentence this spring came at the end of a legal fight that started as a child abuse case and grew into a felony murder prosecution after her teenage son, Austin Raymond, died from complications of cancer in 2019.
What made the case unusual was not only the accusation itself, but the way it developed in court. Prosecutors first pursued abuse charges tied to Dubois’ alleged refusal to seek treatment while Austin was alive. After he died, they moved to add murder charges, forcing judges to decide whether Michigan law allowed a homicide case built on prolonged medical neglect. The answer shaped everything that followed, from the charges the jury saw to the sentence Judge Michael Nolan later imposed.
The early record came from Austin himself. At a preliminary examination on the original child abuse charges, he testified that he first noticed a throat problem in July 2016, when he was 15. By late that year, he said, he could not eat solid foods, had trouble speaking and was having difficulty breathing. He testified that he repeatedly asked Dubois for medical help. According to the appellate opinion, he said she answered by telling him he “was fine,” saying he had allergies and remarking that she did not want to waste gas on taking him to a doctor. That testimony mattered later because it preserved Austin’s own account of what he said, what she heard and how long the alleged neglect lasted.
On Feb. 25, 2019, a district court bound Dubois over on child abuse charges. Austin died on May 20, 2019, before the criminal case was finished. After his death, prosecutors asked to amend the complaint and information to add first-degree felony murder and second-degree murder. A lower court rejected that request, but the prosecution appealed. In July 2022, the Michigan Court of Appeals reversed that ruling and remanded the case for further proceedings, concluding that the prosecution could pursue the felony murder theory. The opinion summarized the factual basis in detail, including Austin’s testimony about his symptoms, his severe weight loss and the repeated requests for care that he said went unanswered.
That appellate ruling did not decide guilt, but it changed the terrain of the case. It meant jurors would eventually consider whether the alleged neglect was serious enough, and intentional enough, to support murder. By the time trial ended in January 2026, prosecutors had persuaded a jury to convict Dubois of felony murder and first-degree child abuse. The murder count carried the heaviest consequence. Nolan later imposed the mandatory sentence of life without parole on March 23, along with a concurrent 15- to 25-year sentence on the abuse conviction. He also denied a defense request to set aside the verdict before sentencing.
The evidence at sentencing and in post-trial reporting filled in details that had sharpened the prosecution’s theory. Austin was later diagnosed with chordoma, a rare malignant bone cancer that prosecutors said was treatable and potentially curable if addressed earlier. Child Protective Services had opened an investigation as his condition worsened, and local reporting said a CPS investigator directed Dubois to seek care. Relatives and Austin’s stepfather helped bring him to appointments, but prosecutors argued that those efforts came too late and did not erase years of inaction by the parent who had primary responsibility. Lapeer County Prosecutor John Miller called the neglect intentional and egregious.
The next stage is likely to return the case to appellate courts, where the conviction and sentence can be challenged. But the legal turning point has already happened: Michigan courts allowed the state to treat the allegations not only as abuse, but as felony murder, and a jury accepted that theory.
Author note: Last updated April 15, 2026.