Dad to go to trial in death of 5-month-old son (Battle Creek, Michigan)

Dad SHAWN BROWN SR. will be going to trial on open murder and child abuse charges in the death of his 5-month-old son. The baby was under Daddy's "care" when he suffered a severe head trauma. We've posted on this case before.

Father to go to trial in son's death
Trace Christenson • The Enquirer • April 30, 2010

A Battle Creek father will stand trial in the January death of his son.

The case against Shawn Brown, Sr., 25, charged with open murder and child abuse in the January death of his 5-month-old son, was sent Thursday to Calhoun County Circuit Court for trial.

"It is clear that the child had been under the care of Mr. Brown and it was clear that something happened about 12:30 p.m. and the child was in the care of the defendant," District Judge John Hallacy said after listening to more than two hours of testimony. "The pathologist said in her finding that the child suffered impact or trauma to the head and all that happens when the child was in the care of the defendant. He minimizes what he did to the child."

The child, Shawn Brown Jr., stopped breathing on Jan. 22 moments before a family friend, Jessica Richardson, stopped at the home where Brown was caring for his son while the boy's mother, Lenora Horton, was working.

"Shawn ran out and said, 'We got to take the Junior to the hospital. He is not breathing.'"

Richardson, trained as a nurse assistant, said the child had a faint breath but was bleeding from the nose.

She tried to breathe air into the baby but said he never started breathing again.

Richardson and several others said Brown told them he was feeding the child formula from a bottle when the baby began choking.

"He said he was feeding Junior a bottle and he began choking," Richardson said.

Richardson said Brown told her he turned the baby over and began patting him on the back, but when he heard a strange sound, he began patting a little harder.

Horton testified that when she arrived at the hospital, Brown told her the same thing.

"I asked him what happened," Horton said. "He said Junior stopped breathing. He is going to be all right. Stop tripping. Junior is going to be all right. He started to choke so he patted him on the back. Then there was a different kind of choke and he patted him a little bit harder."

But Dr. Joyce DeJong, a pathologist who performed an autopsy, said the child suffered severe head trauma, which caused swelling and bleeding of the brain.

She told Assistant Prosecutor Daniel Buscher the force inflicted was significant and the injuries were from impact of the head or violent shaking.

DeJong said the child would show symptoms of the injury within seconds or minutes.

After being taken to Battle Creek Health System, the child was transferred to Bronson Methodist Hospital in Kalamazoo, where he died two days later.

Before he died, several family members gathered at the hospital.

The baby's uncle, Mack McGill, told Buscher and defense attorney James Goulooze that Brown told him about the choking and said: "He didn't do anything. He wouldn't hurt his son. He was just, like, 'I didn't do nothing to my son.'"

Horton told the court Brown seemed calm at the Kalamazoo hospital, and as the rest of the family prayed, "he was looking at the TV."

Trace Christenson can be reached at 966-0685 or tchrist@battlecr.gannett.com.