Arrest warrant:
Warrant: Mother’s boyfriend threw girl to concrete floor
A 3-year-old girl suffered a fractured skull after her mother’s boyfriend smashed her head on the floor.
NEW BRITAIN – A 3-year-old girl from New Britain suffered a fractured skull and other injuries after her mother’s boyfriend smashed her head on the concrete floor of the Washington Street apartment the couple shared, a warrant for the man’s arrest said.
The boyfriend, Frank Alezander Santiago, 24, was held in lieu of $750,000 bail after his arraignment Monday before New Britain Superior Court Judge Julia P. Dewey. He was charged by New Britain detectives with first-degree assault and risk of injury to a minor.
Police said they became aware of the assault on Thursday, when they received a call from the state Department of Children and Families. Earlier, a DCF investigator went to Connecticut Children’s Medical Center in Hartford after hospital staff reported they were treating a 3-year-old girl who’d been seriously injured.
The child was initially treated at the Hospital of Central Connecticut in New Britain but transferred to CCMC for specialized care.
Although the child’s injuries are serious, s he is expected to recover, New
Britain police
Capt. Jeanette
Portalatin said. “I was told that they believe there will not be any lasting effects,” she said.
According to the warrant for Santiago’s arrest, he told his girlfriend that her daughter was cleaning her room whenheheard a thud. He said the 3-year-old ran to him and said she’d hit her head on the wall and had “broke her head.”
He then told the mother, according to the warrant, that the child looked weak so he placed her in the shower. He then dressed her, picked up the mother, and they went to the Hospital of Central Connecticut.
The mother showed a New Britain police officer a video Santiago had sent her. The 3-yearold can be seen in the shower and Santiago is saying, “My love, look at her, she don’t look too good man. Dude, she don’t listen to me bro. Should I take her to the hospital? Please ... I ... I don’t know what to do man.”
According to the warrant, in the video the 3-year-old girl can be seen slowly opening and closing her eye. There is also an area of redness on her forehead, the warrant reads. Santiago also sent the mother a photo of blood in the 3-year-old’s hand, according to the warrant.
When Santiago arrived at the mother’s workplace with the child, the mother checked her and noted a “lump on the left side of the victim’s face.” Once they arrived at the hospital, the girl began to throw up. They were then transferred to CCMC.
At Connecticut Children’s, according to the warrant, the mother sent Santiago home and asked her daughter what had happened. The girl responded that she was coloring and did not hit her head. She did say she was jumping on the bed. The mother told police she thought the girl fell to the concrete floor after getting tangled in bed sheets.
The New Britain police officer who answered the initial call at CCMC then asked for youth bureau detectives to respond and take over the investigation. They obtained permission from the mother and Santiago to search the apartment. When they got there, Santiago was cleaning. Santiago agreed to go to police headquarters for an interview.
At first, according to the warrant, Santiago told a story similar to the one he told the girls’ mother. He was in another bedroom, heard a thud and found the 3-year-old bleeding from the nose. Santiago later began to cry and admitted he had lied, according to the warrant.
Santiago told police that after dropping the mother off, he and the 3-year-old returned to the apartment. He cleaned his room and the 3-year-old cleaned hers. When he checked on her, Santiago told police, she had cleaned the middle of the room, but the rest was still a mess. He said he turned off the TV and told the girl to keep cleaning.
He then said, according to the warrant, that the 3-year-old did not say anything, but rolled her eyes at him.
Later, he told police, he returned to the 3-year-old’s room and said she said “something rude” to him, but that he did not remember what she said. He told police, according to the warrant, that he had had a long stressful day and that he raised his voice and told the girl not to do that.
Then he turned to walk away from the 3-year-old, he told police, “but for some reason turned back to the” girl, according to the warrant. They were facing each other, he said, when he “grabbed her shirt with one hand on her chest and pulled her down hard to the ground,” according to the warrant. Santiago told police the girl’s head “hit the ground first, really hard.” When the girl stood up, he said, she was “woozy” and looked like she’d been knocked out. She then fell to the ground and needed help getting up, he told police, according to the warrant.
Santiago then said he could see her head was swelling and noticed blood coming from her nose. He told police he was worried he “may have killed her,” according to the warrant.
The girl began to bleed heavily, Santiago told police. He texted the mother and told her the girl fell. He then put the girl in the bath tub hoping it would help, he said, and then cleaned her up to dress her.
After the girl was dressed, Santiago told police, she began coughing up blood.
“Santiago believes the incident occurred because he is a schizophrenic and said he did not meanto hurt [the girl],” the warrant reads.
Based on Santiago’s reenactment of what happened, police reached the conclusion that Santiago “violently thrust [the girl] onto the concrete floor.”
At CCMC, the girl was diagnosed with a fractured skull with the break running from her right eyebrow to the bridge of her nose. A CCMC doctor said the injury was caused by a “high energy” movement, according to the warrant. The girl also had internal bleeding, internal and external swelling, a black eye, bruising and petechial hemorrhaging.