The father of the Wisconsin infant who died earlier this month after a 10-year-old girl at his day care allegedly stomped on his head has spoken out, calling the girl a criminal.
Nate Liedl’s 6-month-old son, Jaxon, died from multiple skull fractures on Nov. 1. Less than a week later the boy’s suspected killer, who has not been identified, appeared in Chippewa County court. She was charged as an adult with first-degree intentional homicide.
During her hearing, the girl, handcuffed, sobbed into her mother’s arms.
Liedl told local TV station KTRK in an interview published Saturday that he attended the girl’s hearing to make sure she saw him.
“As opposed to seeing it as a 10-year-old girl, I saw it as the person who killed my son,” he said. “And she, in my opinion, deserved to be in shackles or handcuffs. She’s a criminal.”
The girl’s case will most likely move to juvenile court, but because she is at least 10 years old her case was required to begin in adult court, according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune.
On Oct. 30, Jaxon was taken from his Chippewa Falls day care to a local hospital. His dad said he appeared to be doing alright until he had to be airlifted to to St. Paul, Minnesota. It was there that Liedl learned how serious his son’s injuries were.
“They had mentioned, ‘What are we going to do if his heart stops?’ And it caught me completely off guard,” he recalled to KTRK. “I had sent a couple messages out to family to let them know that Jaxon’s not going to make it. I remember, I broke down out there pretty bad. Yeah, it really hit hard.”
In an interview with police, the woman who runs the day care said she had been watching six children, including the 10-year-old girl and the infant.
The baby was napping, the woman explained, so she instructed the children to stay outside, according to the sheriff’s office. But the 10-year-old girl was seen inside the home shortly before the boy was found bleeding.
Prosecutors have said the fatal assault on the baby began as an accident that spiraled from panic: First the girl allegedly dropped the child and he hit his head, then she stomped on him as she “didn’t know what to do and didn’t want to get into trouble.”
The girl was living in foster care with the day care operator, who is a foster mom.
In a statement to PEOPLE, Liedl says he does not blame the day care: “I believe that it could’ve happened to anyone. … No one would imagine what she [the girl] would do.”
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(The day care operator, through her husband, declined to comment to PEOPLE, citing the ongoing investigation. The girl’s attorney did not return a call.)
Liedl says he wants others to remember his son as he was before his death — a “happy, bubbly, and smiling baby boy” — and not dwell on the morbid details of the violence he suffered.
Liedl and Jaxon’s mother were not together when Jaxon was born and, before his death, they had been scheduled to attend a hearing for Liedl to have more visitation hours. (Liedl says the process took months and should be reformed.)
He says the “outpouring of support” since his son’s killing “has been truly amazing.”
“I waited 37 years for my own little baby boy,” he told KTRK. “I was extremely lucky because he didn’t cry, no fussing. He was happy smiles all the time.”
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