LAKELAND -- March 2009
Earl and Clarissa Johnson gave interviews Sunday in front of the Lakeland home where their son, Zachary, (in photo) stayed and was found dead.
After months of legal troubles, Earl and Clarissa Johnson were about to regain custody of their children.
On Thursday, though, a month before they were to be reunited, Lakeland police say their youngest son, 17-month-old Zachary, was brutally beaten and killed by his uncle, Matthew Wyrosdick.
"He's a murderer," Earl Johnson said Sunday. "He shook my son to death. That's what he admitted to, and I believe he struck him in the head."
Wyrosdick, 32, was arrested Sunday and charged with aggravated manslaughter of a child. He is being held without bail at the Polk County Jail.
Lakeland police detectives gave this account of what happened at Wyrosdick's apartment at 3520 Cleveland Heights Boulevard Thursday morning:
Angry that Zachary wouldn't sit down at a child-size picnic table, Wyrosdick picked up the toddler and shook him so hard his head snapped back and forth. Wyrosdick put Zachary back on the seat, but the boy fell and hit his head on the corner of a coffee table. He said he shook the boy again and marched him to a door where the boy's head struck a stair railing twice. He also said he dropped Zachary on the floor three times.
Zachary was taken to Tampa General Hospital, where a doctor determined the injuries were not consistent with Wyrosdick's explanation, police say. The child died Friday, two hours after Wyrosdick gave his first videotaped demonstrations to police of how Zachary was hurt.
Wyrosdick initially told 911 dispatchers that the boy had fallen from the picnic table.
When neighbor Iris Scandrick saw the ambulance's flashing lights outside her apartment Thursday, she feared the worst for Zachary and his older brother, Austin.
"I had my ear to the wall, and I could hear the kids screaming," said Scandrick, who lives next door to Wyrosdick and his wife, Mysti.
Scandrick said she walked up to Wyrosdick, who was sitting speechless on a patch of grass.
"I stood over him and said, 'You know I heard you slamming that baby around.'"
Wyrosdick didn't answer her, Scandrick said.
Johnson said he and his wife couldn't care for Zachary and Austin, 2, because the couple spent two months in the Hillsborough County Jail on charges of grand theft auto, fraud and petty theft. The Johnsons were released from jail Sept. 12.
Since then, the Johnsons have been working with the state Department of Children & Families to get custody of Zachary and Austin, DCF spokeswoman Carrie Hoeppner said.
The children were placed with the Wyrosdicks because they were the only relatives who passed a DCF background check, the Johnsons said. Children usually only go into foster care when relatives are not available, Hoeppner said.
Scandrick, the Wyrosdicks' neighbor, said she reported possible abuse to DCF in early March, but Hoeppner said her agency received no complaints about the Wyrosdicks.
Zachary's older brother, Austin, does not have any injuries and is back with his parents, Hoeppner said.
No comments:
Post a Comment