Dad pleads guilty to 3rd-degree murder in death of 10-week-old daughter (Norristown, Pennsylvania)

Another testosterone-fueled, aggressive young dad who never should have been left home alone with a baby who was practically a newborn. This time the dad is KHALIL ANTONIO BROWN. Notice that Dad apparently didn't even live with the baby's mother, so this was essentially a visitation situation.

http://pottsmerc.com/articles/2011/06/23/news/doc4e040b587c962656774160.txt?viewmode=fullstory

Father headed to jail for shaken-baby death of his 10-week-old daughter
Published: Thursday, June 23, 2011; Last Updated: Thu. Jun 23, 2011, 7:33am

By Carl Hessler Jr.
chessler@pottsmerc.com

NORRISTOWN — A 21-year-old man is headed to state prison after he admitted to causing the death of his 10-week-old daughter by recklessly shaking her, causing her to suffer traumatic brain injuries.

Khalil Antonio Brown, of Philadelphia, was sentenced in Montgomery County Court on Wednesday to 10 to 20 years in a state correctional facility after he pleaded guilty to a felony charge of third-degree murder in connection with the Jan. 28, 2010, death of his daughter, Aniyah, inside a relative’s Plymouth Township residence.

Brown, who was 20 at the time of the incident, also must complete 20 years of probation after he’s paroled from prison.

“This was a man who we believe violently shook his 10-week-old daughter, causing her death. There can be no excuse or justification for that,” said Assistant District Attorney Jordan Friter, who argued for the maximum allowable sentence of 20-to-40 years in prison against Brown.

The child’s mother and grandmother, as well as relatives of Brown, were in court for the emotion-filled hearing.

“The impact on the family is just unimaginable, the pain they have had to deal with, not only losing a child but losing a child in this way, at the hands of the father. Having to deal with that I can’t even begin to fathom what that’s like,” Friter added.

Judge Joseph A. Smyth recommended that Brown be placed in a state prison facility that caters to youthful offenders. The judge further ordered Brown to complete anger management and parenting classes and to undergo mental health treatment.

Authorities previously said they have been unable to determine a motive for the deadly shaking and that there was no indication the baby was crying at the time of the incident.

Brown, sobbing at times, apologized for his conduct and implied he still does not know why he committed the crime.

“This was a tragic case of a young father ill-prepared to take care of his infant daughter,” defense lawyer Louise Petrillo argued on Brown’s behalf. “The tragedy is that Aniyah, his daughter, will not be around for him and the family to enjoy.” 2

Petrillo argued for a minimum sentence of six years imprisonment for Brown.

“He doesn’t know why it happened. He can’t explain it. He is so sorry,” Petrillo said.

By pleading guilty to the murder-related charge, Brown admitted that while he was alone in the home with the child he shook her to the point that he caused severe injuries that later caused her death and that he acted recklessly and ignored the risk that his conduct could cause death or serious bodily injury.

Aniyah Brown died several days after the Jan. 28 incident at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where she had been on life support.

After receiving a call about an unconscious baby, Plymouth Township police went to the Chestnut Street residence around 9:41 a.m., and reportedly found the infant, who wasn’t breathing, bleeding from the nose in a second-floor bedroom, according to a criminal complaint.

Brown, who identified himself as the girl’s father, told officers he had gone upstairs to check on the child that morning and noticed she wasn’t breathing and then called 911. The baby was taken to Montgomery Hospital in Norristown and later transported to The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia for advanced medical care. Brown allegedly admitted to investigators days after the child was injured, that he picked her up while she slept in an upstairs bedroom and shook her, according to court papers.

Brown, who had been staying at the Plymouth Township home of his girlfriend’s mother, gave no explanation for the incident, according to prosecutors.

On Feb. 2, doctors at Children’s Hospital told detectives the baby had suffered a severe brain injury and multiple hemorrhages in both eyes. A day later, doctors pronounced the girl dead. She had been kept alive to enable organ donations but was removed from life-support equipment.

A forensic pathologist who performed an autopsy on the baby determined she died from a cerebral hemorrhage.

Also on Feb. 2, during a second interview with Plymouth Detective Jeffrey McGee and county Detective Mark Minzola, Brown reportedly admitted picking the baby up from the bed she was sleeping on and shaking her for “less than five minutes,” according to the criminal complaint. Continued...

Brown and the baby were the only people in the house at the time, according to authorities. After allegedly shaking the girl, Brown reportedly said, “she just went dead and stopped moving.” When he was asked to describe how he shook her, Brown allegedly answered it “could be rough.”