A 40-year-old man has been charged with murder after allegedly beating a two-month-old girl to death in a jealous rage and then attempting to pin the fatal injuries on his six-year-old autistic son, prosecutors in Washington, D.C., have said.
Demetrius Beatty appeared in court this week over the death of Khamyah Honesty, who was found unresponsive at an apartment block on New Jersey Avenue in the south-east of the city on 16 August.
Officers were called at around 9.45pm and discovered the infant in Mr Beatty’s arms. She had bruising to her face, head trauma and bleeding in her eyes, and was pronounced dead at Children’s National Hospital in the early hours of the following morning.
A forensic pathologist concluded that Khamyah had suffered severe fractures to her forehead, the back of her head and beneath her chin. The injuries were ruled non-accidental and could not have been inflicted by a young child.
Prosecutors allege that Mr Beatty killed the baby — who was born eight weeks premature and was a twin — out of resentment because the children had been fathered by another man while he and their mother were in a relationship.
Court documents state that Mr Beatty had threatened the mother eight days before the incident, warning that he would kill the children if she left them in his care. The mother testified that he made similar threats when she visited the twins’ biological father, who is currently incarcerated.
In a 911 call placed from a neighbour’s telephone, Mr Beatty sought to blame his non-verbal six-year-old son, telling the dispatcher: “I have an autistic son, and I have a two-month-old daughter. I guess my autistic son got to the two-month-old daughter and was fighting her, and he damaged her pretty good.”
He added: “Her face is swollen, her nose is bleeding. I need help quick.”
When questioned by police and social workers, Mr Beatty was unable to remember or spell Khamyah’s name, initially referring to her as “Maya”, according to court records.
Investigators noted that he offered shifting accounts, claiming at various points that he had been in the hallway making a telephone call, that another seven-year-old child had “tossed” the baby, or that he had been playing ball with the children when the injury occurred.
Mr Beatty was arrested on 16 September, a month after the infant’s death, and made his first court appearance the following day.
His defence team argued for his release under 24-hour home confinement, noting that he had called 911 immediately and had raised the children as his own with no prior history of physical abuse against them. The defence also pointed to the six-year-old’s history of behavioural issues, citing the mother’s statements that the boy possessed significant physical strength.
The judge, however, refused pretrial release, citing a prior probation revocation which had resulted in a 45-day custodial sentence.
Metropolitan Police Department officers described conditions inside the flat as “filthy and cluttered”, with stained walls, piles of laundry and burnt aluminium foil floating in a lavatory. First responders said the surviving twin was suffering from severe nappy rash, while another one-year-old child in the home had a healing burn on her back.
Concerns about the children’s welfare had been raised before the fatal incident. Court records show that a relative of the twins’ father contacted the D.C. Child and Family Services Agency on multiple occasions over the preceding two months. On one occasion, Mr Beatty allegedly locked the infant twins inside a cupboard.
Medical staff also disputed the mother’s account of an incident at Congress Heights Metro Station 16 days before Khamyah’s death, during which the infant was said to have fallen roughly 75 feet down an escalator after slipping from a car seat.
Following Mr Beatty’s arrest, the D.C. Child and Family Services Agency took custody of the four surviving children who had been in the home. He is due back in court on 28 September.
