Friday, December 10, 2010
Logan County Man Charged With Child's Murder
WEST VIRGINIA....
The Logan County Sheriff's Department arrested 24 year old Jonathan Lee Hager of Lyburn Friday for first-degree murder and death of a child by parent, guardian or custodian after his 3 year old stepson died in the Logan Regional Medical Center on December 3rd. Officers, who noticed a knot on the child's forehead and bruises on his chest, were told the child had been jumping on a bed, fell and struck a coffee table and then stopped breathing. Police ruled the child's death a homicide after an autopsy determined the child's cause of death to be from asphyxiation and not blunt force trauma, which is not consistent with falling on a coffee table. Hager later told officers he attempted to physically discipline child, who was jumping on the bed, but he resisted, causing both to fall to the floor, with Hager's knee landing on the child's chest between 30 seconds and one minute. The West Virginia Chief Medical Examiner said a knee across the child's chest would be consistent with the cause of asphyxiation but Hager's knee had to have been across the child's chest for longer than one minute.
The Logan County Sheriff's Department arrested 24 year old Jonathan Lee Hager of Lyburn Friday for first-degree murder and death of a child by parent, guardian or custodian after his 3 year old stepson died in the Logan Regional Medical Center on December 3rd. Officers, who noticed a knot on the child's forehead and bruises on his chest, were told the child had been jumping on a bed, fell and struck a coffee table and then stopped breathing. Police ruled the child's death a homicide after an autopsy determined the child's cause of death to be from asphyxiation and not blunt force trauma, which is not consistent with falling on a coffee table. Hager later told officers he attempted to physically discipline child, who was jumping on the bed, but he resisted, causing both to fall to the floor, with Hager's knee landing on the child's chest between 30 seconds and one minute. The West Virginia Chief Medical Examiner said a knee across the child's chest would be consistent with the cause of asphyxiation but Hager's knee had to have been across the child's chest for longer than one minute.
# posted by Homer Owens @ 9:27 PM 
