Police in Pennsylvania have arrested a 47-year-old father for allegedly violently shaking his crying infant daughter to death, Luxury Handbag Shopping has learned.
David Lee Souden of New Holland had already been booked on aggravated assault of a child and endangering the welfare of children charges after calling police to his home the afternoon of February 1 to save his unresponsive 3-month-old daughter. But investigators added a third-degree murder charge late last week, after the infant died on Thursday, February 5, at Penn State Health Children’s Hospital in Hershey.
Souden is accused of forcefully shaking the newborn girl after she refused to stop crying and then leaving her in a bassinet, where she was when police arrived.
The baby’s name has not been released.
When Souden turned himself in to East Earl Police, he declared that he had killed his daughter.
Police later questioned Souden at the West Earl Township Police station, where he allegedly told detectives he was the infant’s sole caregiver.
He allegedly explained to police he was feeding the baby girl and became enraged when she started crying and would not stop.
At that point, Souden told cops he “violently” shook the baby three or four times, causing her head to snap back and forth. He said the baby developed a “blank stare” before going limp, and “changing colors.”
Souden told investigators he tried performing CPR on the baby’s fragile body when she stopped breathing. He then laid the baby in her bassinet and left the house, assuming she was dead.
Souden admitted that he did not call 911 or make any bona fide attempts to get the child help, again noting he thought she was already dead.
He was arraigned before Magisterial District Judge Adam Witkonis and he is being held on $500,000 bail.
Souden has no attorney of record, and at a preliminary hearing held Tuesday, February 10, he was not asked for any pleas.
If not fatal, shaking an infant in anger can leave the child with significant and life-changing brain injuries.
For years, doctors labeled any serious brain injury that was caused when an infant’s head was injured through violent shaking or a hard, forceful impact “shaken baby syndrome.” In 2009, the diagnostic term was changed to abusive head trauma.
Even briefly shaking an infant can cause irreversible brain damage as well as partial or total blindness, developmental delays, behavioral issues, cerebral palsy, and seizures or epilepsy.
There are about 1,300 reported cases of shaken baby syndrome or abusive head trauma in the U.S. each year, according to data kept by the National Center on Shaken Baby Syndrome.
If you suspect child abuse, please call the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453, or visit ChildHelp.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential, and the hotline is available 24/7 in more than 170 languages.
