SAMUEL (Stringfield) DAHLKE - 6 yo (2011) Chargede: Biological father: Billy Joe Stringfield II - San Diego/ Ramona CA

http://ramona.patch.com/articles/authorities-release-name-of-ramona-boy-who-died-in-his-sleep-and-his-father-s-identity-disabled-shaken-baby-homicide

Authorities released the name Wednesday of a severely disabled 6-year-old boy who died in his Ramona home of complications from parental abuse he suffered as an infant. That assault is now classified as a homicide.

Emergency crews responding to a medical distress call pronounced Samuel
Dahlke dead at his adoptive family's home shortly before 12:30 a.m. Tuesday, according to sheriff's officials and the county Medical Examiner's
Office.

Chris Dahlke told Fox 5 San Diego she found her son not breathing when she went to give him medication around midnight.

An autopsy determined that the youngster had succumbed to effects of a head injury suffered when he was about 6 weeks old. His death was ruled a homicide, according to police.

Samuel's biological father, Billy Joe Springfield II, was convicted in 2006 of abusing the boy in 2005 at an apartment in the Golden Hill district of San Diego. Springfield, who was 23, at the time was sentenced to four years probation, according to a spokeswoman for the District Attorney's Office.

The child's name was changed when he was adopted by the Dahlke family.

San Diego Police Department will work with prosecutors to determine whether to file additional charges against Springfield in light of the child's death, SDPD homicide Lt. Kevin Rooney said.

The injuries that Samuel suffered from being violently shaken as a baby left him with severe, permanent disabilities, including paralysis and blindness, his adoptive mother told Fox 5.

"He had every disability,'' Dahlke said. "He had no ability to move his body at all. He couldn't walk. He couldn't crawl. He couldn't roll. He had no ability to use his body at all.''

Springfield moved out of California in 2007, according to Fox 5. Rooney declined to disclose where the potential homicide suspect now lives.

Disabled boy’s death ruled a homicide

Because of parental abuse a severely disabled Ramona boy suffered as an infant, authorities have classified his death on Nov. 29 as a homicide.

Emergency crews responding to a medical-distress call pronounced Samuel Isaiah Dahlke dead at his adoptive family’s Ramona home in the 1000 block of Olive Avenue shortly before 12:30 a.m., according to sheriff’s officials and the county Medical Examiner’s Office.

Chris Dahlke, the boy’s adoptive mother, reported she had found her son not breathing when she went to give him medication.

An autopsy determined that the youngster had succumbed to after-effects of a head injury suffered when he was about 6 weeks old, and his death was ruled a homicide, according to police.

Samuel’s biological father, Billy Joe Springfield II, was convicted in 2006 of abusing the boy the previous year at an apartment in the Golden Hill district of San Diego. The then-23-year-old defendant was sentenced to four years probation, according to a spokeswoman for the District Attorney’s Office.

The child’s name was changed when he was adopted by the Dahlke family.

The San Diego Police Department will work with prosecutors to determine whether to file additional charges against Springfield in light of the child’s belated death, SDPD homicide Lt. Kevin Rooney said.

The injuries that Samuel suffered from being violently shaken as a baby left him with permanent disabilities, including blindness, inability to communicate and heart problems, his adoptive sister, Barbara Smith, told the Sentinel.

“He was a shaken baby and he had severe trauma from that initial injury,” said Smith.

Smith added that her mother specializes in the care of shaken babies. Three other special-needs children live in the home, she said.

Rooney declined to disclose where the potential homicide suspect now lives.

http://www.ramonasentinel.com/2011/12/01/disabled-boy%E2%80%99s-death-ruled-a-homicide/

Dad charged with murder in abuse case

By Kristina Davis
3:29 P.M.OCT. 8, 2013

SAN DIEGO — A murder charge has been filed against the biological father of a Ramona boy who investigators say suffered severe brain injuries as an infant and later died as a blind and bedridden 6-year-old.

Authorities said the 2011 death of Samuel Dahlke — renamed by his adoptive parents — stemmed from the abuse he endured at the hands of Billy Joe Stringfield II just six weeks after birth.

Stringfield, 30, who also uses the last name Springfield, was arrested on a $1 million warrant and pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, assault on a child and involuntary manslaughter at a San Diego Superior Court arraignment on Sept. 30. He has been released from jail on $250,000 bail.

Paramedics were called to Stringfield’s Golden Hill apartment in 2005 and found the baby gray and unresponsive, according to an affidavit supporting the arrest warrant.

Stringfield, who was enlisted in the Navy, told them the baby had fallen a week earlier, and had started acting “all retarded” upon putting him in his crib.

The paramedics noticed that Stringfield and his wife seemed “unnaturally calm and unemotional,” and later declined a doctor’s recommendation to follow their son to the pediatric intensive care unit at the San Diego Naval Medical Center in Balboa Park, the court records state.

The baby suffered from extensive retinol hemorrhaging, continuous seizing and bleeding on the brain.

Upon further questioning by San Diego police, Stringfield blamed the injuries on possibly handling him too hard, shaking him and picking him up from the crib too roughly, the affidavit said.

The baby underwent several surgeries so he could survive off life-support, although the boy would never see, hear, walk, talk or eat ever again. He was placed in a foster home equipped to handle a medically-fragile child that year under the care of the Dahlke family, who later adopted him.

Samuel required 24-hour care, including a machine that suctioned saliva out of his lungs and a liquid diet fed through a tube.

He was found dead in his bedroom on Nov. 29, 2011.

Stringfield has already been prosecuted for the abuse. A jury in 2006 found him not guilty of a felony charge but convicted him of misdemeanor child abuse.

He was put on probation and moved to Houston.

He told a psychologist at the time that he was in shock when the paramedics came to the home, explaining why he didn’t show much emotion, according to court records. He also said he felt hospital staff didn’t properly treat his son during an earlier visit for a fall injury, and that he was being used as a scapegoat.

http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/Oct/08/dad-stringfield-springfield-murder-abuse-dahlke/