A 2-year-old child (pictured) was found strangled and beaten to death Saturday, and his mother and her boyfriend have been charged.
Aiyden Davis, who was just a few days shy of his third birthday and who was known as being playful and good natured, had apparently been abused for quite some time, according to police reports.
Police are still investigating what led to the tragic turn of events, but the toddler's mother, Theresa Davis, had apparently left boyfriend Reginald Williams to watch the boy while she worked as a security guard.
Davis' 44-year-old aunt Pamela Davis called her niece's home to check on the child. During a second phone call, at 6:45 p.m., Williams told Pamela that he had spanked the tot for messing up his ABCs and had placed him in a corner. When the aunt called the third time to check on the baby around 8:45 p.m., Williams whimpered, "I'm so sorry, P. I'm so sorry," but offered no explanation for the apology.
Davis immediately sensed something was wrong and called her niece at work to tell her what had happened, but the 27-year-old mom just sloughed off her aunt's concern.
Police were summoned to the Brooklyn, N.Y., apartment when a call was placed to 911 by a male voice who said the toddler was "breathing but unresponsive." The unconscious child was taken to a local hospital and pronounced dead upon arrival.
The medical examiner's office said the cause of death was "blunt impact injuries of the head, torso and extremities with liver laceration and internal bleeding." The investigators also noted that there were old and new bruises up and down the child's torso.
Neighbors told police that they had recently heard yelling and crying coming from the apartment.
The boy's father, Ameen Foster, 33, (pictured above) told investigators that he saw no signs of abuse when he last visited his son. Foster, who was estranged from his wife, also claimed that he did not know that Davis had been living with Williams. Shocked by what occurred, Foster fought back tears when he told the New York Daily News:
"I don't know what happened. Theresa is not like that."
Assistant District Attorney Colleen Babb also told the Daily News that Davis admitted over the past month that she beat her son with a belt and gave Williams permission to discipline him.
Williams, 31, was charged with second-degree murder. Davis, 27, was also arrested on charges of assault, endangering the welfare of a child and criminal possession of a weapon. Her charges stemmed from the assault with a belt, the police said.