Custodial dad with outstanding criminal warrants charged with aggravated manslaughter for suffocation death of 6-year-old son (Englewood, Florida)

Still no explanation (surprise!) as to how a father with a history of abuse (animal cruelty) and other criminal behavior managed to get custody of a young child, much less who gave it to him. What happened to this boy's mother? Why has she been erased from the story?

Very typical news story concerning an obviously custodial father (who is not openly identified as such, but clearly is) along with lots of airbrushing and erasure of key points as to how this apparent killer managed to secure access to his victim.

Dad is identified as JAMES DEARMAN.

See the Killer Dads and Custody list for Florida.

http://www.fox13news.com/news/local-news/69627562-story

Dad, girlfriend arrested in son's Christmas Eve death

Shayla Reaves reports       

Posted:Jan 06 2016 05:27AM EST Updated:Jan 06 2016 10:29AM EST

ENGLEWOOD (FOX 13) - A man and his girlfriend are behind bars following the death of a 6-year-old boy this past Christmas Eve.

The Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office says it happened at a home in Englewood, where 31-year-old James Dearman and his girlfriend, 22-year-old Ashley Cole, were playing video games that night.

According deputies, Dearman’s 6-year-old son and his 7-year-old sibling were in the room, and had been told to stand with their faces to the wall. But things turned violent when the youngest turned around to look at the television.  

Investigators say Dearman got angry and forced his son to lie on the couch, on his side with the cushions covering his mouth.

"He then pinned his son against that part of the couch using his body weight and pressed against him. The child repeatedly told him he couldn't breathe and eventually became unconscious," said Captain John Walsh of the Sarasota County Sheriff's Office.

Deputies say after his son passed out, Dearman and Cole went to smoke a cigarette in the garage before they called for help.

Dearman reportedly told first responders that his son was unconscious and had stopped breathing. The boy was pronounced dead at the hospital, where they also spotted bruising on his back.

Investigators arrested Dearman the following Monday, December 28, for outstanding animal cruelty and damage to property warrants out of Georgia. He was later charged with aggravated child abuse, which was then upgraded to aggravated manslaughter of a child on New Year’s Eve.

Deputies arrested Dearman’s girlfriend, Cole, on Monday, January 4, after investigators learned she may have helped hold the boy down during the incident. She’s been charged with principal to aggravated manslaughter of a child.