Dad charged with 2nd-degree murder for killing 1-year-old son (Terrebonne, Louisiana)

Call me an old-fashioned gal. Call me a ball-breaking gender feminist. I really don't care what label you slap on me. I'm still going to object to the new social engineering concept that you see here in and in other child abuse articles like this one. And that is that babies should be passed around like so many hot potatoes instead of being left in the care of their mothers, where they are generally the safest.

Notice that this baby had been staying at the paternal grandmother's house for the past MONTH when unemployed dad CODY JOHN PAUL BOURG "allegedly" suffocated the baby "for crying" while he was "watching" him. Why was the baby at the paternal grandmother's? Why did Mom have to come to the house to "visit" her own baby? This isn't how this is supposed to work! This couple wasn't even married. They didn't even have what passes as a committed relationship these days.

I'm guessing that Mom was overwhelmed and working, thus having to rely on the paternal grandparents and this deadbeat daddy for "care." Unless this was an actual custody arrangement to make sure the deadbeat daddy didn't get stuck with child support. Wouldn't surprise me....

Too bad we don't honor mothers and let them care for their own babies these days In my world, Daddy would be off his @$$, working, and letting the mom do her job on the home front.

http://www.dailycomet.com/article/20101031/ARTICLES/101039964/1212?p=1&tc=pg

Dad charged with killing 1-year-old

By Kathrine Schmidt
Staff Writer

Published: Sunday, October 31, 2010 at 6:01 a.m.
Last Modified: Saturday, October 30, 2010 at 11:41 p.m.

HOUMA — A Terrebonne man is charged with suffocating his 1-year-old son to death, police said Saturday.

Cody John Paul Bourg, 23, 122 Garth Drive, was arrested Friday and booked on a single count of second-degree murder in the death of his son, Julian Bourg. Cody Bourg remained in the Terrebonne jail Saturday in lieu of a $500,000 bond. If convicted, he faces mandatory life in prison.

But the accused man's mother, brother and other family members interviewed Saturday night are devastated by the turn of events and said Bourg was a good father who would never hurt his child. Julian, they say, had a few respiratory problems but was otherwise healthy. He apparently suddenly stopped breathing Oct. 19 in the home on Garth Drive in the Ashland North subdivision, relatives said.

“He would never hurt him,” said Tammy Bourg, Cody Bourg's mother. “He was my tenderhearted child.”

A person who answered the phone at the home of Melvin Kappel, the Julian's maternal grandfather, said the family had no comment. Attempts to reach the child's mother, Kristen Kappel, and maternal grandmother, Jaqueline Nutter, were unsuccessful.

Bourg and Kappel had previously lived together, but weren't married and had an on-again, off-again relationship, Bourg's family said. At the time the child died, he had been staying at Tammy Bourg's house on Garth Drive for about a month, and Kristen Kappel had also come to visit that day, the family members said.

Bourg's family on Saturday night sat in the living room and recounted how the blond-haired Julian used to scamper around the floor. He was just starting to try and walk and talk, they said, and he liked to play with “knickknacks” from the kitchen.

Tammy Bourg and other members of the family, including her other son, John Bourg, 18, had been taking a nap that afternoon on Oct. 19 as Cody Bourg was watching the child. But he rushed in, saying the child had stopped breathing. They immediately called 911 and began to perform CPR, the family said.

Police and firefighters arrived from the Grand Caillou Fire Department and Acadian Ambulance to continue lifesaving measures. They took him first to Leonard J. Chabert Medical Center, then to Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans, where he died two days later.

The mother's family buried the child, the Bourgs said. Already grieving from the loss, the family said they were blindsided when they heard about the charges against their son. The police had not told them foul play was suspected, only that they needed to ask Cody Bourg some questions, they said.

Medical investigation revealed death from asphyxiation, and Bourg was the only one with the child at the time, police said.

Detectives determined the father suffocated the baby when he wouldn't stop crying, police said, but Capt. Dawn Foret, a spokeswoman for the Terrebonne Sheriff's Office, wouldn't say how police reached that conclusion or how the child was allegedly killed. Bourg had no prior criminal record, Foret said.

Bourg's family said he liked to watch movies, wrestling and football. He was unemployed, but cleaned, cooked, cut the lawn and helped take care of the baby, his family and friends said.

Staff Writer Kathrine Schmidt can be reached at 857-2204 or Kathrine.schmidt@houmatoday.com.