Mother To Be Charged With Murder After 5-Month-Old Boy Dies Inside Tioga Home, Sources Say
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- A mother will be charged with murder in connection to the death of her 5-month-old boy, Philadelphia police sources say. Sources and internal documents say the Philadelphia's District Attorney's Office approved a murder charge, but the suspect has yet to be arraigned.
Police sources say the mother allegedly admitted to investigators that she beat her boy with objects in his room of their home on the 1600 block of West Erie Avenue in the city's Tioga neighborhood. The boy had bruising to his face and neck area, according to police sources.
The boy was found unresponsive just before 9:30 a.m. in his bedroom on the third floor of a shared apartment-style home on Saturday. He was pronounced dead just minutes later.
Neighbors say the mother moved into the building around March.
"When I came out there were police in front of my door, police down the street and an ambulance," neighbor Russell Turner said. "It's just a tragedy that it happens in our neighborhood."
After the baby was found unresponsive, neighbors saw the boy's mother with police.
"She was outside the house, out on a cellphone. She was out on a cellphone. She didn't really have no more cry, no tears in her emotion yet, but it's coming," neighbor Lawrence Seals said.
Neighbors believe she called her sister earlier for help.
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"I heard she called her sister that night it all happened and the sister didn't get there until that morning," Turner said.
As the community searches for answers, neighbors have begun grieving the life lost of an innocent baby boy.
"That's sad. He didn't even live his life yet," neighbor Markeema Harrison said. "That's not fair at all to that baby. I don't know if the money has anything to do with it, but if she did, she deserves to go to jail."
Authorities have not yet released the names of the mother or child.
The mother was on parole until 2022 on a previous conviction. She has 16 priors.
CBS3's Chantee Lans and Joe Holden contributed to this report.
