ANIYAH BATCHELOR - 2 yo/ Accused : 12 yo Foster brother - Fort Washington MD

12-year-old charged with murder of toddler

By Paul Duggan and Ovetta Wiggins
Published: July 5

A 12-year-old boy in Fort Washington has been charged with second-degree murder in the beating death of a 2-year-old girl who was staying with his family as a foster child under the supervision of social services officials, Prince George’s County police said.

The victim, Aniyah Batchelor, had been in foster care since November, according to her mother, Stephany Cunningham, who has two other children, both being cared for by other people. Aniyah, who turned 2 in March, had been placed with a family of five in a house in the 1800 block of Taylor Street, where she was beaten by the 12-year-old boy Tuesday, police spokeswoman Julie Parker said.

Parker would not say whether detectives had determined a motive for the attack, but she said the 12-year-old boy had “beaten the child repeatedly” in a single incident. No weapon was used, she said.

The foster parents, a man and a woman, were not at home at the time of the incident, Parker said.

She said the parents have three biological children — girls ages 15 and 4, in addition to the 12-year-old boy — and that the older girl was in charge of the other youngsters when the beating occurred.

Without providing a specific timeline of events, Parker said the foster father “was summoned home” late Tuesday morning, after the beating, and found
Aniyah unconscious. He called 911 at 12:09 p.m. As an ambulance headed to the house — a neatly kept brick-front split-level with red shutters and a small front lawn — the father tried to revive Aniyah with cardiopulmonary resuscitation, Parker said.

The girl was pronounced dead at a hospital. After an autopsy Wednesday, Parker said, the Maryland medical examiner’s office concluded that the girl was a
homicide victim and that the cause of death was blunt-force trauma. Shortly afterward, the boy was charged with second-degree murder.

Second-degree murder, or murder that is not premeditated, is a lesser crime than first-degree murder. Because the boy was charged as a juvenile, police
declined to identify him, who they said is being held at the Cheltenham Youth Facility.

Cunningham, 25, of Landover said her other children are a 5-year-old girl and a 3-year-old boy. Last fall, she said, she had custody of Aniyah and her other daughter, but her son was being cared for by a relative. Cunningham said she was living in an Adelphi apartment at the time. One day in November, she said, the relative brought the 3-year-old boy to visit her, and a horrible accident occurred.

Cunningham said someone — not her — mistakenly put the boy in a tub filled with scalding water while trying to give him a bath. “He got all burned,” she recalled, sobbing loudly on the phone.

“His skin was coming off real bad.”

As a result of that incident, Cunningham said, a Prince George’s County judge removed the two girls from her custody. She said that the 5-year-old girl went to live with a foster family in the District and that Aniyah was placed with the family in Fort Washington.

Foster children in Prince George’s are the responsibility of the county’s Department of Social Services and its parent agency, the Maryland Department of Human Resources. Police referred all questions about the Fort Washington family to Pat Hines, a spokesman for the state human resources agency. Citing privacy rules, Hines would not discuss Aniyah or the foster parents’ history of caring for children under state supervision.

Cunningham said she usually visited with Aniyah on Thursdays at a county social services office.

Over the months, she said, she got to know the foster parents, and she thought well of them until this week. “I want to know how can they let kids watch kids and let my baby get beat,” she said, crying on the phone.

Meanwhile, on Taylor Street, a woman named Jean Price spoke through tears about the 12-year-old boy, who was a neighbor. She said he would routinely stop playing basketball in his driveway to help her take groceries out of her car.

“I loved him so much,” she said. “He was the sweetest child you’d ever want to know.”

She said she and her husband, Jim Price, have known the family for about eight years, and she described the parents and youngsters as “wonderful.”
“Their whole family is so special,” Jean Price said, adding that the 12-year-old boy sometimes talked with her about his grades. When she asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up, she said, he replied, “I want to be successful.”

“I told him you’re already on your way because you have the character that stands out.”

Police said the boy is the first preteen accused of murder in the county since 2006, when a 12-year-old boy was charged as a juvenile with stabbing and beating to death his mother and 9-year-old brother. Prosecutors later said that the boy, who did not have a previous arrest record, pleaded “involved” — the equivalent of guilty — in juvenile court.

Under Maryland law, youths ages 14 to 17 can be charged with certain crimes as adults at the discretion of prosecutors, and upon conviction those teenager can be sentenced to an adult prison. In such a case, the burden is on the teenager to convince a judge in adult court that the matter should be handled in juvenile court.

After a juvenile court trial or plea, even a teenager who has committed a murder cannot be held in a detention facility beyond his or her 21st birthday.

With suspects younger than 14, like the Fort Washington youth, the case must start in juvenile court. In most instances, if prosecutors want the case moved to adult court, they must convince a juvenile court judge that the youngster’s criminal history is so heinous and extensive that rehabilitation in the juvenile system is not an option.

Although police would not discuss any criminal record involving the 12-year-old boy, Capt. Joseph R. Hoffman said police had not been summoned before to
the house and had no history of involvement with the family.

Asked whether authorities would seek to have the case moved to adult court, Parker said police and prosecutors are conferring on that question. “At this point, he has been charged as a juvenile,” she said, but “that could change.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/12-year-old-charged-with-murder-of-toddler/2012/07/05/gJQAsbEAQW_print.html

Boy charged in death was ‘play fighting’ with toddler

By Andrea Noble, The Washington Times
Tuesday, September 4, 2012

A 12-year-old boy charged with second-degree murder in the death of a 2-year-old foster sibling was not the focus of detectives’ investigation until he admitted to police to “play fighting” and striking the girl up to six times, a Prince George’s County homicide detective said.

Police were interviewing family members about 2-year-old Aniyah Batchelor — who died from blunt-force trauma July 3 at a Fort Washington hospital — when the young boy made the admission, Detective Spencer Harris said Tuesday in court during a motions hearing in the case.

“He was one of more than three possible suspects,” Detective Harris said.

The boy has not been named because he is being charged as a juvenile. Prosecutors have not sought a juvenile waiver hearing, which would be required in order for the boy to be charged as an adult.

The motion’s hearing was held in Prince George’s County Circuit Court on Tuesday to determine whether the boy’s admission could be used as evidence in his trial. It was expected to continue Wednesday before Judge Sherrie L. Krauser.

Aniyah died July 3 after her foster father found her unresponsive at the family’s home in the 1800 block of Taylor Avenue in Fort Washington, police have said. A 15-year-old sibling of the boy was overseeing the two children and a 4-year-old during the time police believe Aniyah was beaten. According to a police source with knowledge of the case, the 15-year-old found Aniyah crying — apparently as a result of being hit in the chest and abdomen — and put her to bed. Later, the 15-year-old went to check on the toddler, saw she was unresponsive and called the father.

Aniyah had been placed in the family’s care because of a court-ordered ruling, county police said.

Homicide Detective Denise Shapiro was interviewing the boy about the incidents of the day when he admitted to striking the girl, even demonstrating a punch that made an audible smack, said prosecutor Wesley Adams.

After detectives told the boy’s biological parents about the admission, the boy’s biological mother came into the police department’s interview room to talk to him. During the conversation, which was recorded, the mother told the boy that Aniyah was “beaten all over her body. She has bruises all over her body,” Mr. Adams said. The boy then told his mother, “I didn’t beat her like that,” Mr. Adams said.

The boy’s defense attorney, Raouf Abdullah, argued against the use of the boy’s admission to police, questioning detectives about the timeline of their interview and when they believed they began interviewing the boy as a suspect rather than just a witness in the case. When a juvenile is taken into custody, Mr. Abdullah said police should notify the child’s parents immediately.

The boy’s grandmother dropped him off at police headquarters to be questioned and his mother was being interviewed herself when he made the admission, Detective Harris said.

The boy’s family declined to comment Tuesday.

Because the boy is facing charges as a juvenile, he could only be ordered held in a juvenile detention facility until the age of 21 if he is found involved — the juvenile court equivalent to guilty.

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12-year-old convicted in 2-year-old foster girl’s beating death

By Matt Zapotosky
Published: September 5

A 12-year-old Fort Washington boy on Wednesday was convicted in juvenile court of involuntary manslaughter in the beating death of a 2-year-old foster girl living with his family.

The boy had admitted to a detective that at least six times he hit Aniyah Batchelor, who suffered internal injuries, Prince George’s Assistant State’s Attorney Wesley Adams said in court. He said that the beating occurred July 3, when the boy was home with Aniyah and his two biological sisters, ages 4 and 15.

The Washington Post generally does not name juveniles who are charged with crimes.

The boy — who initially faced a more-serious second-degree murder charge — did not admit guilt as part of his so-called Alford plea but acknowledged that prosecutors had sufficient evidence. Raouf Abdullah, the boy’s attorney, said his client agreed to the plea to spare his own family and Batchelor’s family an emotional trial, although he still disputed some of prosecutors’ accusations.

“This ends this trauma for the entire family,” Abdullah said.

Aniyah was placed with the boy’s family in November after she was removed from her home because of “allegations of physical abuse” related to one of her brothers, authorities have said.

Police had previously said that the boy’s father found Aniyah unconscious and called 911. The father had been called home by his 15-year-old daughter, who was watching the other children, they said.

During Wednesday’s hearing in Prince George’s County, the boy, who stood barely taller than his attorney’s shoulders, wore a red sweatshirt and athletic shorts.

When Judge Sherrie L. Krauser listed the charges against him and asked if he knew what they meant, the boy responded, “Yes. Well, not really.” When the judge asked him to explain what his plea meant, he was unable to do so.

Prosecutors had said previously the boy did not like Aniyah and did not want her in the home.

After Wednesday’s hearing, Abdullah disputed those accusations, saying the boy admitted to hitting Aniyah under “duress” and that he never told a detective that he didn’t want her in the home.

He said that the boy — who was involved in soccer, basketball and the science fair, his parents said at an earlier hearing — was “a delightful child” and that the case “essentially amounts to like an accidental death.”

Technically, the boy was found “involved,” the juvenile court term for a conviction. He will be held at the Cheltenham Youth Facility until a disposition hearing Oct. 23.

Although he could face incarceration until he is 21, he will first be evaluated by doctors to determine a rehabilitation and treatment plan, Abdullah said.

As deputies led the boy out of the courtroom in handcuffs, he cried and tried to lift his arms to wipe tears from his face. After the hearing, the families of the boy and Aniyah declined to comment.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/12-year-old-convicted-in-2-year-old-foster-girls-death/2012/09/05/262fc31a-f797-11e1-8398-0327ab83ab91_story.html