Father Found Not Guilty Of SBS Returns To His Family
Dec. 13, 2010
Trial starts in Franklin County court for man accused of assaulting his 3-month-old daughter
FRANKLIN COUNTY — A Chambersburg man charged with assaulting his infant daughter was in court Monday for the first day of a jury trial scheduled for the whole week.
Much of the testimony Monday consisted of highly detailed medical descriptions of injuries inflicted upon Leiana Trina Billups, the daughter of Jamel Lee Billups, 32, when she was 3 months old.
Dr. Kathryn Crowell of Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, Hershey, testified that she examined the baby in October 2009. She said the child will likely have permanent brain damage as a result of her injuries, which could have been fatal.
According to police, the infant was brought to Chambersburg Hospital Oct. 19, 2009, with a traumatic head injury. Tests indicated that she suffered multiple old rib fractures, hemorrhaging and extensive retinal damage, consistent with a shaking event.
Crowell read from a hospital report that stated “from a medical perspective” the baby’s injuries are the “clinical picture of inflicted trauma.” She said it was several doctors’ opinion that the child was the victim of “shaking, plus or minus impact.”
Billups is being representing in the trial by attorneys Mark Freeman and Christopher Basner.
During his cross-examination of Crowell, Freeman asked questions about the bone-softening disease rickets, blood clotting disorders and other potential non-violent explanations for the severity of the baby’s injuries.
“We ruled out other causes based on the analysis of her scans,” Crowell said.
A Chambersburg Hospital Emergency Room doctor who initially saw the baby and a Chambersburg Police detective also testified Monday, according to Assistant District Attorney Lauren Sulcove.
After Crowell’s lengthy testimony, a Chambersburg Police officer and a special agent with the state attorney general’s office took the stand.
John Greenawalt of Chambersburg Police Department testified that he seized a hard drive from the computer at the home of Billups and the baby’s mother, Jacqueline Rosario. The device was taken for analysis by Special Agent Abel Rios.
It was determined that someone had used the computer to access the online gambling program “Full Tilt Poker,” for an undetermined period of time, Rios testified.
According to the affidavit, Billups told police that he had just sat down to play online poker when the baby began to cry. He reportedly said that he was going to continue playing with the baby on his lap, until he realized she wasn’t breathing normally.
Rios was the last witness to testify for the day. Judge Shawn Meyers adjourned court shortly before 4:30 p.m.
The trial was expected to resume at 8:30 a.m. today. Sulcove said the day would begin with testimony from prosecution witness Dr. Mark Dias, a pediatric neurosurgeon at Hershey Medical Center.
Testimony continues in infant assault trial
CHAMBERSBURG, Tuesday, Dec. 14 – A Franklin County jury heard hours of medical testimony this morning in the trial of a man accused of shaking his infant daughter until she suffered brain injury.
Dr. Mark Dias, a pediatric neurosurgeon at Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, Hershey, took the stand shortly after 8:30 a.m. Tuesday. He testified that he was one of the doctors to care for 3-month-old Leiana Trina Billups in October, 2009.
Dias told the jury that based on his expert opinion, the baby suffered permanent brain damage as the result of being shaken violently.
The baby’s father, Jamel Lee Billups, 32, of Chambersburg, is charged with aggravated assault and endangering the welfare of a child. His defense team contends that the child’s brain bleeding and other health problems were the result of a stroke.
Assistant District Attorney Lauren Sulcove said she intends to rest her case against Billups by the end of today’s proceedings. Another doctor and a detective with Chambersburg Police Department are expected to testify after lunch.
Dec 14
Jury sees interview video in shaken baby case
Billups
A Chambersburg man accused of shaking his infant daughter until she suffered brain injury last October told police that he was always “very delicate” with his children.
A jury watched a video Tuesday of Jamel Lee Billups, 32, being interviewed by a detective on the day his daughter was flown to Milton S. Hershey Medical Center.
Chambersburg police Detective William Frisby Jr., who conducted the interview, was the last witness to testify Tuesday in the Billups trial. The prosecution has now called all its witnesses, and the defense is expected to begin presenting its case this morning.
“I promise I won’t use any big words or mention any medical lingo,” Frisby said to the jury as he approached the witness stand.
In that respect, his testimony was an exception. The other two witnesses heard Tuesday were both doctors who discussed Leiana Trina Billups’ brain damage and other physical problems in great detail.
Frisby said he was called in to interview Billups on Oct. 19, 2009 after Chambersburg Hospital notified police about the baby’s injuries. The taped interview was played for the jury.
In the video, Billups told Frisby that his daughter had been acting healthy all day, until the afternoon when she awoke from her nap crying. He described her as “tensed up” and arching her back, and said she didn’t seem to be breathing normally.
“It just wasn’t right,” he said in the video.
Using a doll to demonstrate, Billups showed Frisby how he picked
up and held his daughter after she began crying. He also re-enacted how he tried to get a response from her using what he called a “wake-up tap” on her face.
“That’s the most trauma to the head that I did today, or that I would do to her,” he said in the video.
During the interview, Billups described the way he handles his children as “very delicate.”
“I love both my kids very much,” he said.
Defense attorney Christopher Basner asked Frisby during cross examination if he would agree that Billup’s account of the Oct. 19, 2009 has remained consistent. Frisby said he agreed.
Dr. Mark Dias, a pediatric neurosurgeon at Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, Hershey, was the first witness to testify Tuesday. He told the jury that, based on his expert opinion, the baby suffered permanent brain damage as the result of being shaken violently.
He said possible effects of the baby’s brain damage include lasting vision problems, stiffness and difficulty moving her limbs, mental retardation and cognitive impairment.
“We don’t know the extent, but I can virtually guarantee you that she will have some problems,” Dias said.
According to testimony, testing indicated that Billups’ daughter suffered 16 rib fractures between four and six weeks prior to suffering head injury, brain hemorrhaging and extensive retinal bleeding consistent with a shaking event
Billups is charged with aggravated assault and endangering the welfare of a child. His defense team contends that the infant’s brain bleeding and other problems were the result of a somewhat rare type of stroke called cerebral venous thrombosis.
In his testimony, Dias used a traffic analogy to explain the workings of blood vessels in the head. He compared clotting, also called thrombosis, to car wrecks that disrupt the flow of traffic.
Dias testified that, in his experience and according to the literature he has read on the matter, there is no evidence that CVT “causes a catastrophic loss of consciousness and disorderly breathing,” he said.
During cross examination, defense attorney Mark Freeman referred to a scholarly article written by another doctor who contends that the level of force required to cause retinal bleeding by shaking is “biomechanically improbable.”
Dias said he disagreed with the statement, and that “a minority of people” in his field would agree with it.
“You’re picking one person’s point of view, which is fine,” Dias said to the lawyer. “That’s your job.”
The doctor said tests for thrombosis were performed on the baby weeks after she was first brought to the hospital. “Not only did we find no evidence (of thrombosis), we also found evidence of what we would expect with abusive head trauma,” Dias said.
At one point during his the cross examination, Freeman asked Dias if he was a radiologist.
“No, I’m a neurosurgeon,” Dias replied.
Dr. Arabinda Choudhary, director of pediatric neuroradiology at Hershey, also testified Tuesday that the baby had blood on her brain and retinal hemorrhages, as well as apparent brain swelling and bruising.
He showed the jury MRI images that he said showed Leiana’s damaged brain. The blue and white cross-sectional views of the baby’s head showed noticeable differences between the left and right sides.
He said that “based on (his) training and experience,” the was “no evidence of thrombosis” in the baby’s scans. He showed the jury images of a normal adult brain alongside images of the same brain with thrombosis, and explained the differences.
Assistant District Attorney Lauren Sulcove said she will formally rest her case against Billups first thing today. The defense is expected to call its first expert witness, a doctor, about 9 a.m.
Juror dismissed this morning in Billups trial
CHAMBERSBURG — Dec. 15, 2010 — A juror was apparently dismissed this morning from the ongoing trial of Jamel Lee Billups, the Chambersburg man accused of shaking his infant daughter.
The cause of the dismissal came during testimony by defense witness Dr. Julie Mack, a radiologist at Milton S. Hershey Medical Center. Judge Shawn Myers and the attorneys for both sides were having a sidebar conference when Mack, who was on the witness stand, had a brief conversation with the juror.
Myers told the doctor that any interaction between a witness and members of the jury is forbidden, however innocent her intentions may have been. During a short recess, he questioned her about the nature of the conversation.
She said that the juror seemed to have an issue with her knee, so she asked if it was sciatica. The juror replied that she had loose bone fragments in her knee, according to Mack’s testimony. The doctor said she had never testified in a criminal trial before, and was unfamiliar with all the protocol.
During the recess, Assistant District Attorney Lauren Sulcove and both attorneys representing Billups met with the judge in chambers. Shortly after, everyone seated in the courtroom’s viewing gallery was asked to step into the hall.
The juror who spoke with Mack was seen leaving the courtroom carrying her coat. When the trial resumed, one of the two alternate jurors was sitting in the former juror’s chair. The jury is composed of eight women and four men.
Mack completed her testimony and Myers called a lunch recess until 2:15 p.m. Billups’ defense is expected to call its next witness at that time.
Accused wishes he’d called 911 sooner
Jamel Lee Billups told a jury Wednesday that he regrets not calling 911 sooner on the day his infant daughter was hospitalized with blood on her brain.
“I really wish I would have done something sooner,” he testified under cross-examination by Assistant District Attorney Lauren Sulcove.
Billups described in detail the events of Oct. 19, 2009, the day of his 3-month-old daughter’s trip to the Chambersburg
Hospital emergency room. Those events led to a child abuse investigation and criminal charges.
Billups took the stand Wednesday afternoon wearing dress slacks and a striped button-down shirt. Although he has been incarcerated at Franklin County Jail since November 2009, he has worn street clothes rather than an orange jumpsuit since the week-long trial began Monday.
Questioned first by his defense attorney, Christopher Basner, Billups talked about finding the baby in apparent distress, then nervously pacing around the apartment trying to get a response by tapping on her cheeks and blowing in her face.
“This is exactly what happened,” he said.
When the mother of his two children, Jacqueline Rosario, got home from work around 5 p.m., they rushed the baby to the hospital. Shortly after they arrived, a doctor told the couple the child would probably not survive, according to testimony.
Soon Leiana Trina Billups was on her way by helicopter to Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, and her parents were asked to answer some questions at the police station.
“I was confronted with the allegation of being an abuser to my child,” Billups said. “I was totally shocked.”
During her cross examination, Sulcove asked Billups how much time had passed between the moment he first became aware the baby was not well and when Rosario get home from work. He said it was between two and three minutes.
Sulcove pointed out that in his taped interview with a police detective, Billups said the baby first began to cry around 4 p.m. and according to testimony Rosario didn’t arrive till about 5 p.m.
Billups said that on the day of the interview, he had been mistaken. “I can’t be exact on timeframes,” he said.
According to testimony, Billups called 911 after Rosario came home, right before they decided to drive the baby to the hospital themselves. Sulcove asked why he hadn’t called for help sooner.
“To be honest with you, if I could go back, I probably would have,” he said.
Late in his testimony, Billups spoke about his role as a parent and became emotional, raising his voice and directly addressing the jury while apparently fighting back tears.
“I dedicate my time to my children 150 percent,” he said. “My hobbies are my kids.”
He talked about teaching his older daughter using flash cards and carefully braiding her hair with pieces of a bandana for Independence Day. “You have no idea,” he told the jury. As a “stay-at-home dad,” he was responsible for both children throughout every weekday.
As Billups was speaking several people sitting in the courtroom gallery, including his mother and Rosario, began to cry. A male family member got up and left the courtroom, apparently distraught.
“I was mommy and daddy,” Billups repeated several times from the stand, adding that his tears were “not a stunt.”
After both attorneys had finished asking their questions, Judge Myers told the jury that Billups was convicted of robbery in the state of New York in 2001. He said the information was only to be used the weigh the truthfulness of the man’s testimony.
Billups could be heard sobbing as the judge was giving the instructions. He left the witness stand with a tissue in his hand.
Rosario also testified Wednesday afternoon, telling the jury that she remains supportive of Billups. She recalled the day she came home from work to find her baby breathing irregularly and crying out in pain, then the devastating news from a doctor after he saw the child’s CT scan.
“He told me that she had bleeding in her brain, and he said there was no chance of her making it,” she said.
Billups is charged with aggravated assault and endangering the welfare of a child. His defense team contends that the infant’s brain bleeding and other problems were the result of a rare disorder called cerebral venous thrombosis.
The defense also argues that the discovery of 16 older rib fractures can be explained by the baby’s Vitamin D deficiency. Rosario testified that she has been tested twice, and both times they indicated her own body is significantly low in Vitamin D.
“So, she’s got a Vitamin D deficiency problem and she has thrombosis?” Sulcove asked Rosario during cross examination.
“She can. I’m not a doctor,” the mother answered.
Earlier in the day, a juror was apparently dismissed from the proceedings for having a brief conversation with someone on the witness stand.
The defense’s first witness, Dr. Julie Mack, a radiologist at Milton S. Hershey Medical Center was testifying when the incident happened. Judge Shawn Myers and the attorneys for both sides were having a sidebar conference when Mack spoke with the juror.
Myers told the doctor that any interaction between a witness and members of the jury is forbidden, however innocent her intentions may have been. During a short recess, he questioned her about the nature of the conversation.
She said that the juror seemed to have an issue with her knee, so she asked if it was sciatica. The juror replied that she had loose bone fragments in her knee, according to Mack’s testimony. The doctor said she had never testified in a criminal trial before, and was unfamiliar with all the protocol.
During the recess, Sulcove and both attorneys representing Billups met with the judge in chambers. Shortly after, everyone seated in the courtroom viewing gallery was asked to step into the hall.
The juror who spoke with Mack was seen leaving the courtroom carrying her coat. When the trial resumed, one of the two alternate jurors had taken the former juror’s place. The jury is still composed of eight women and four men.
Mack testified for the defense, telling the jury that the baby’s brain bleeding and retinal hemorrhages could be explained by thrombosis instead of abusive trauma.
The trial was adjourned for the day shortly before 5 p.m. It is expected to resume today with the defense calling its next witness at 9 a.m.
Billups found not guilty of shaking infant daughter
CHAMBERSBURG, Friday , Dec. 17 – A man accused of shaking his infant daughter was set free Friday after a jury found him not guilty of aggravated assault and endangering the welfare of a child.
Jamel Lee Billups, 32, Chambersburg, mouthed a thank you to jurors after the verdict was read.
“I’m very happy,” said Jacqueline Rosario, mother of the child. “He gets to come home to his kids.”
Defense Attorney Mark Freeman argued that Billups was accused because of a medical misdiagnosis of the condition of his daughter, Leiana. His case relied on complex testimony from a medical expert and recent medical research.
Defense witness Dr. Patrick Barnes, a pediatric neuroradiologist at Stanford University, testified that Leiana suffered brain damage a year ago from health conditions that mimic child abuse.
Franklin County Assisitant District Attorney Lauren Sulcove told jurors in her closing argument that the “constellation of injuries” had no other explanation than child abuse.
The jury deliberated for two hours.
Chambersburg father acquitted of child abuse charges
A Chambersburg man was acquitted Friday of charges that he shook his 3-month-old daughter.
Jamel Lee Billups, 32, Chambersburg, mouthed a “thank you” to jurors after the verdict was read, and untucked the shirttail of his blue dress shirt.
“Thank you,” he said quietly, looking upwards.
“I’m very happy,” said Jacqueline Rosario, mother of the child Leiana, now 18-months-old. “He gets to come home to his kids. We’ll be a family for the weekend. He hasn’t seen them in 14 months.”
The couple also has a 3-year-old daughter.
After hearing six days of medical testimony in Franklin County Court, the jury deliberated for two hours during lunchtime on Friday and had enough reasonable doubt they found Billups not guilty of aggravated assault and endangering the welfare of a child.
Billups has maintained his innocence from the beginning, according to Rosario and Defense Attorney Christopher Basner of Newport.
Billups’ defense relied on complex testimony from a medical expert and recent medical research.
Defense witness Dr. Patrick Barnes, a pediatric neuroradiologist at Stanford University, testified that Leiana suffered brain damage from health conditions that mimic child abuse.
Leiana’s doctors said that her “constellation of injuries” had no other explanation than child abuse, according to Franklin County Assistant District Attorney Lauren Sulcove. In her closing argument she singled out injuries to ligaments at the back of the child’s
neck and swelling at the back of her head.
“You’ve heard the old saying: If it walks like a duck, looks like a duck and swims like a duck, it must be a duck,’” Sulcove addressed the jury. “It’s your job to call it what it is.”
Sulcove maintained that Billups’ testimony was not credible.
“He changes the facts every time he testifies,” she said. “There’s a bit of truth in every lie. You have to listen carefully.”
Sulcove said Billups’ prior conviction for robbery in New York nine years ago is evidence of his deception.
Judge Shawn Meyers instructed the jury that Billups’ conviction must be used only to judge his credibility and not his innocence or guilt.
“There was a tragedy that happened on Oct. 19(, 2009); a young child suffered a stroke,” said defense attorney Mark Freeman of West Conshohocken.
The girl’s brain damage resulted from a rare disorder known as cerebral venous thrombosis, according to defense witnesses. The 16 fractures to her front ribs were the result of a likely deficiency of vitamin D at her birth. A severe lack of the vitamin is linked to congenital rickets, or fragile bones.
Investigators “had the blinders on” after seeing her condition, Freeman told the jury. They failed to follow up on low levels of Protein S, an indication of venous thrombosis. There were no signs of external trauma, classic signs of shaken baby syndrome.
“Sometimes you see what you’re looking for,” Freeman said. “The entire case is based on the presumption of trauma.”
Sulcove countered: Leiana is “the one time on the planet” where venous thrombosis and bone fragility have come together. Abused children do not always have visual injuries.
Leiana, as of her last test in May could not see, will have difficulty walking and may be mentally retarded, Sulcove said.
Freeman, who specializes in elder law, appeared in his first criminal trial. Freeman said he previously researched false child abuse.
“A personal friend had almost the identical thing happen to him,” Freeman said after the trial. “Child abuse is a horrible thing. Charging parents is a pretty horrible thing too. The real tragedy is they didn’t have any defense at the dependency hearing.”
But when Franklin County Children and Youth Department heard about Billups’ defense expert Barnes, they quickly returned the two girls to Rosario, Freeman said.
Comm. V. Jamel Billups – Media Reports
http://www.publicopiniononline.com/ci_16852338
http://www.publicopiniononline.com/ci_16855501
http://www.publicopiniononline.com/ci_16861375
http://www.publicopiniononline.com/ci_16861829
http://www.publicopiniononline.com/ci_16870637
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