Murder Charged Against 8 Year-Old-Boy After Beating 1 Year-Old-Girl To Death

When a 1-year-old girl wouldn't stop crying while her mother was at a club, an 8-year-old boy became annoyed and "viciously attacked" the toddler, beating her to death.

Little Kelci Lewis suffered severe head trauma and "major internal organ damage," leading to her death.

Police say the girl's mother, Katerra Lewis, 26, and her roommate, a mother of five, went out for a night on the town about 11 p.m. on October 10. Lewis left Kelci under the supervision of her roommate's children, all far too young for the responsibility. Read the full article on CNN : Alabama police charge 8-year-old with murder in death of 1-year-old.

Much about the investigation into the Oct. 11 death of the girl, Kelci Lewis, remains shielded from public view, but the police have accused the boy of an attack that they said left the toddler with “severe head trauma, as well as major internal organ damage.” The children were not related, and the authorities said the attack took place after six children, none of them older than 8, were left unsupervised at a northeast Birmingham home.

The toddler’s mother, Katerra M. Lewis, was charged with manslaughter. Ms. Lewis’s lawyer, Emory Anthony Jr., said on Wednesday that she was “saddened that she’s lost a child, and she’s saddened that they’ve charged her for the death of her child.”

“It is unclear yet whether it’s a substantive disaster in terms of mistreating this child or whether it’s a public-relations disaster,” said David M. Smolin, the director of the Center for Children, Law and Ethics at Samford University in Birmingham. “It really depends on the details of the child’s situation.”

Read the full article on NYTIMES : ‘No Easy Answers’ in Murder Charge Against 8-Year-Old

SOURCE : NYTIMES, CNN