Police say that a grandpa and grandmother are in jail because they beat their 5-year-old granddaughter with a belt more than a dozen times because she went to the toilet by herself.
Illinois officials told the horrible details of how 5-year-old Jada Moore was killed on July 14. Prosecutors told NBC Chicago that the girl had been beaten for more than two months and had serious contusions that are usually seen in people who have been in car accidents.
Klent Elwoods, 62, and his wife, Lisa Jones, 57, have been charged with first-degree murder in Jada’s “death, which the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office has decided was a” murder caused by multiple injuries from child abuse.
Around 11 p.m. on the night of the accident, Elwoods called 911 to report a child who was “not responding.”
He allegedly told the dispatcher, “I was beating my little granddaughter, but she is over it now.” When the police arrived, the girl was “lying on the couch naked.”
The girl was given CPR by EMTs before being flown to Comer Children’s Hospital, where she died early Saturday morning, according to the New York Post.
The grandfather told the cops that he started beating Jada because she wet her pants. “I was a little too rough with my grandbaby,” he is said to have said while riding in the back of the police car.
Jones reportedly told police that Jada “had a history of ‘pooping’ on herself,” and that the last time Jada had a bathroom accident, Elwoods told her that he would beat her with a belt if she did it again.
The grandpa is said to have kept his word when he found out that night that she had pooped on herself.
“Then Elwoods got a belt and told Jada to bend over. Elwoods then hit Jada’s bottom between 10 and 12 times.” The child fell to the floor after each blow, according to what her grandma told the police. After the last blow, the 5-year-old did not get back up.
Authorities searched the house and found a dirty pair of pants, a belt, a notarized letter from Jada’s mom giving the grandparents custody over school and medical choices, and a calendar with four dates in June marked that allegedly showed when Jada had defecated on herself before.
Prosecutors also told the court that both grandparents admitted to beating Jada often with a belt, their bare hands, and a shoe.
An autopsy showed that the little girl was covered from head to toe with “bruises, abrasions, and scars in various stages of healing.” The Post said that she also had what are called “internal avulsion” or “contusion” pockets in her back, bottom, and legs.
“Because of the force needed to cause an avulsion pocket, they are often seen in car accident injuries,” authorities said.
“The avulsion pockets show that the victim has lost blood into the soft tissue. Because children have less blood in general, these pockets are more dangerous for them.”
Jada also had bleeding between her brain and skull, which was a sign that she had a brain injury.
ABC 7 Chicago said that the beatings started about a month into Jada’s stay with her grandparents. They had taken her in at the beginning of April, saying they would give the 5-year-old “a better home life” because her mother in Atlanta had fallen on hard times.
The judge didn’t let the grandparents out of jail. They have to go back to court on August 2nd.