Elizabeth Davis Age 2 - Beaten to Death - August 14, 2004
'Is this a case where the system failed ... ' The grandmother of a slain 2-year-old Miamisburg girl is frustrated and sad as the case is no closer to going to trial. By Cathy Mong Staff Writer Sunday, September 17, 2006 MIAMISBURG — The paternal grandmother of 2-year-old Elizabeth Davis wants the Montgomery County Prosecutor's Office to tell her why no one has been charged in the child's homicide more than two years ago. In the wake of charges filed in July against Heather and Doron Silverman of West Carrollton in the deaths of their two children, Prosecutor Mathias Heck Jr. issued a terse edict: ". . . we will do everything within our power to see that abusive parents or parents who injure or murder their children spend their lives behind bars." Miamisburg police who investigated Elizabeth's death are frustrated, as is the girl's paternal grandmother, Jeanna John. None of them wants anyone to forget about the child who died Aug. 14, 2004. It took 8 to 24 hours for the girl to bleed to death internally after someone struck her abdomen hard enough to split open her liver and nearly sever her small intestine, according to the autopsy report. Assistant county prosecutor James Levinson said he considers Elizabeth's case "very active," but noted, "Our responsibility is not to pursue a charge if we know it is not supported by probable cause, and to pursue a case that is probable cause. Probable cause is based on what available evidence shows. Not all evidence becomes available immediately." Police Officer Kirk Bell, lead detective in the case, said he and other investigators have met with prosecutors five times since the girl's death. As far as police are concerned, he said, the investigation is "pretty much done." Libby Nicholson, director of CARE House — a partnership of Children's Medical Center, county children services, Dayton police and the county sheriff's and prosecutor's offices — said cases such as Elizabeth's are difficult to prosecute, but that cooperation among various groups working to ensure children's safety is imperative. "When that system breaks down, that's when things fall apart and justice is not served. Anytime a child dies and the ruling is homicide, and we don't have a better understanding of it, we should all be troubled by it. . . . In this community, it's not uncommon for a child to be killed and not to have someone held criminally responsible. Part of it is the nature of the beast. Part is the breakdown of the system. Is this one we can't get a handle on? Is this a case where the system failed to come together?" What happened the day Elizabeth died The Dayton Daily News has followed Elizabeth's case for about 18 months. Investigators, the coroner's office and acquaintances of the Davises were interviewed. Police reports recounting interviews with more than a dozen witnesses were studied. Using the information gleaned, the paper was able to reconstruct the last hours of Elizabeth's life. • 2 a.m. Friday, Aug. 13, 2004: Lisa Davis and her boyfriend, Robert "Shorty" Lingus smoke crack in bed. • 8:30 to 9 a.m.: Davis is awakened by Elizabeth, who is knocking on her door to get out. It's locked because Davis told police she locks it from the outside. Davis put Elizabeth in her bed and the three sleep together until 10:30 a.m. • 11:30 a.m.: Davis' and Lingus' "dope" is delivered. • 2:30 p.m.: Elizabeth and Davis return to a bedroom. Later, Elizabeth, Lisa Davis and a friend visit downstairs and talk. • 6 p.m.: Pizza is delivered. Elizabeth's meal for the day is a piece of pizza. Thursday's meals consisted of cheese, crackers and chips. Wednesday, she ate nothing. Lingus leaves at 11 p.m. Sometime Friday night, Davis spanks Elizabeth by sitting on a couch and pinching the girl's legs between hers. She tells police, "I think I pulled her britches down and busted her butt," and also hit the child on her thigh and hands when she attempted to free herself. Davis said she disciplined the child because she "back-talked." She tells police she has the child's head "bent over the cushion . . . I did punish her, but I did not do anything above the stomach; below the butt, yes, is where I paddle her, is where I've always paddled her." When Elizabeth tells her "no" again, she "put her on the wall." That form of punishment, Davis tells police, is similar to what is "done to prisoners." She describes it as pushing the child's forehead against a wall with hands clasped behind her, feet spread apart. • Midnight Aug. 14: Lingus returns. Elizabeth and Davis are dozing on the couch, but Elizabeth is fussy. She is taken up to her own bedroom, and the three watch TV until the girl falls asleep. • 4 a.m. Aug. 14: Davis and Lingus hear a "thud" from upstairs and discover Elizabeth climbing back into bed. Lingus tests her for a concussion by asking her to follow his finger with her eyes. • 5:30 a.m.: Elizabeth begins vomiting. • 11 a.m.: Davis makes scrambled eggs for Elizabeth, who gags and vomits again. She continues to get sick in her bed, in every trash can in the apartment and in the bathroom. • Noon: Elizabeth cries as she has a "very hard" bowel movement. Davis and Elizabeth lie down about 1 p.m. Elizabeth usually plays outside her home, 1019 Orchard Hill Drive at the Southland Village Apartments, but she spends this day inside, vomiting. Davis tells a neighbor she stops counting after the child becomes sick to her stomach for the 16th time. The child sleeps fitfully, refuses food, whines and points to her stomach, which is "rock hard." That morning, Davis declines an offer from her parents, Clinton and Margaret Davis of Moraine, for tickets to A Day in the Country, the daylong music festival in Huber Heights. Lingus decides to accept a ticket and is gone the entire day. • 5:30 to 6 p.m. Aug. 14: Davis returns to bed with Elizabeth, who is snoring. • About 8:30 p.m. Aug. 14: Lingus phones, awakening Davis. She notices Elizabeth is not breathing and her eyes are half closed. Lingus tells her to call 911. • 8:49 p.m. Aug. 14: Officers respond to the apartment and relieve two neighbors who have been performing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on the child, who is unresponsive. They continue CPR until medics arrive and connect the child to a defibrillator in attempts to restart her heart. Miamisburg police Officer Tim Hunsaker acts on a decision to "scoop and run" with her to a waiting Miamisburg ambulance and drives her to Children's Medical Center in Dayton. She is pronounced dead at 9:26 p.m. "Paramedic Brett Ray asked me if I had seen all of the bruises on the infant's chest/stomach and legs," Hunsaker writes in a supplemental report dated Aug. 14, 2004. Randy Brannon, a county coroner's investigator, joins Hunsaker at the hospital and examines the 38-pound child, photographing a bruise under her right jaw and several places on her chest and stomach, according to Hunsaker's report. The coroner's report The next morning, Miamisburg police Sgt. R.L. Terry attended the postmortem exam by county Assistant Coroner Dr. Kent Harshbarger. Bruises were found on the girl's torso, legs and palm of her right hand. A large contusion was found under her scalp, "occupying the majority of the frontal scalp." Harshbarger said he believed the blows that ultimately killed Elizabeth were delivered sometime between Friday night (Aug. 13) and Saturday morning (Aug. 14). Harshbarger told Sgt. Terry the child's injuries could not have been the result of a fall from a bed, as Davis and Lingus suggested to police. "(Harshbarger) stated (the injuries sustained by the child) could not (result from a fall) unless the fall was from a great height such as the roof of a home," Terry noted in a supplemental police report. On Aug. 19, 2004, Harshbarger ruled the death a homicide due to blunt-force injuries of the abdomen, after being struck by another. Other injuries include a possible "face grab," in the area of the right eye, with bruising in the shape of a thumb and four fingers. There is one bruise, circular in shape, above the eye and four bruises below. Another bruise is on the top of the head, above the forehead. It is significant and is in the area that is consistent with the "on the wall" discipline Davis described. During the postmortem exam, Harshbarger told police the injuries to the abdomen could not be attributed to the CPR. Bruising on the chest might have been caused by the fingertips, but were too high to have injured the internal organs and not related to the peritonitis caused by the nearly-severed small intestine. The bellyful of blood predated the CPR, he said. In a memo to Officer Bell, Mary Cisco, a forensic scientist from the Miami Valley Crime Laboratory, said the child's DNA was found on all samples of vomit-stained clothing, bedding and trash that police collected. "There's a lot of detail in this case, a lot of suffering," Bell said. The police investigation Davis admitted to police that she used heroin the day the child died. She also admitted to having a "terrible temper." Despite taking her daughter to an urgent care center a few days before the death for treatment of bug bites, Davis said she failed to recognize her daughter's malaise and growing discomfort the day she died. Office Manager Lora Terrill at Miami Valley Urgent Care in Miami Twp., confirmed Elizabeth was treated for bug bites Aug. 7, 2004, but nothing abnormal was noted on the child's chart. Davis and Lingus had been a couple about 3½ months before the child's death. The man the child had begun calling "daddy" told police Davis was the disciplinarian in the house. Lingus said he sometimes disagreed with her forms of punishment, but went along with placing Elizabeth "on the wall." Shortly after the death, Officer Bell snapped photographs in the apartment. He found a syringe in the master bedroom, trash cans overflowing with dirty diapers, food and dirty dishes strewn about, and as many as 10 butane lighters. Lingus and Davis admitted the glass pipes were used to smoke crack, but Davis said she hadn't smoked for 10 days before the child's death. Davis also told investigators she instructed Elizabeth how to smoke marijuana. The woman who liked to wrestle and was known in the ring at a Trotwood flea market as "Eclipse" also told police she would "shadowbox" with Elizabeth but never punch her. Elizabeth, in fact, "could hit pretty hard," Davis told police. Police are frustrated; Work 'pretty much done' "Everybody involved feels it is going to be solved, and we won't rest until it is solved," prosecutor Levinson said. "The key to any case is putting together the case to win it, not just charge it." Though Miamisburg police have called the case a priority, there have been no developments. Officers said they are frustrated by the lack of charges. "This is terrible," Bell said. "It's really sad." He said if Davis, who had legal custody, knew the child was in distress and did not seek medical attention, then she should at least face a charge of involuntary manslaughter. "If that child was brought to the hospital four hours sooner, she probably would have lived," Bell said. "She was vomiting blood all over the apartment and you don't seek medical help? You take a nap?" Davis, arrested by Miamisburg police two days after the child's death, was released two days later after Heck's office declined to press charges for lack of evidence. At that time, Davis' attorney, Jon Paul Rion, said his office was awaiting the coroner's report. He said then that the child might have died of natural causes. Keeping the case alive through new arrests On Aug. 7, 2006, Davis was arrested on misdemeanor drug charges based on what was found in the apartment after the death. She is scheduled for a hearing in Miamisburg Municipal Court on Nov. 2. She again will be represented by Rion, who did not respond to requests to discuss the case. Lingus, charged with Davis, had his warrant on charges of drug possession (marijuana), drug abuse instruments and paraphernalia delivered to the Greene County Jail. He's there until Feb. 7 on unrelated charges of assault, driving under suspension and obstruction of official business. "We had to charge these people with something," Bell said. Life after Elizabeth for her grandmother, Davis "In my mind, there's no closure on this," Jeanna John said. "It's like she didn't exist and nobody cares." Elizabeth's biological father — Jeanna John's son, Kevin — proved his paternity in May 2003 through DNA testing. John hoped the test result would allow more open communication between the Davis and John families. Kevin John, 24, has his own issues. Diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism, he did not form close bonds with Elizabeth, Jeanna John said. Two months after the paternity results, the John family began proceedings to win visitation. "We had to wait until she could speak for herself," John said. "We feared that Lisa was going to harm her. Once again, the law says you have no proof, just a hunch." Davis' second child, Steven, was born April 14, 2005, eight months after Elizabeth, her first child, died. County children services opened a case on Steven two weeks after his birth after drugs were detected in his system. The child advocacy and protection agency had "concerns, given what happened to Elizabeth," said Ann Stevens, the agency's public information spokeswoman. In June 2005, satisfied that Davis was living with her parents and that Steven would have additional adult supervision, the agency closed its file. Jeanna John has had a difficult 25 months, especially when stories surface of area children being abused. At first, she was obsessed with keeping Elizabeth's memory alive. Now, her focus has broadened to others' children. "I don't hold much hope for Elizabeth," John said. "I love her. I miss her. I'm sad for her, but it's become a whole new thing for me. Instead of hating the world, I'm trying to stop it from happening to anyone else." She frequently visits her granddaughter's grave at Forest Hills Memorial Gardens on North Dixie Drive. "I leave a toy or statue, or a card and flowers," she said. But there's no marker. "We offered to pay for it," she said. "I said they could pick out a memorial but it had to have a little picture of Elizabeth and two urns, one for each family." The Davis family refused, John said. Davis and her parents live in a small house in Moraine, where tempers sometimes flare. Police were called there Aug. 5, 2005, on a report of a domestic dispute between Lisa and her father, Clinton, 55. The Davises told police their daughter had lived with them for a year since their granddaughter's death. Clinton told the officer the death is under investigation and that has caused tensions among them. Lisa told police she got into an argument in part because she stayed overnight with her infant son at a friend's house, and her father called her a "baby killer." On Aug. 22 this year, Davis celebrated her 22nd birthday. Not long after, she gave birth to another baby boy. Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2353 or cmong@DaytonDailyNews.com. http://www.daytondailynews.com/n/content/oh/story/news/local/2006/09/16/ddn091706grandmother.html?cxtype=rss&cxsvc=7&cxcat=16