We might be witnessing a gross miscarriage of justice down in Jacksonville. A 12-year-old boy hit his two-year-old brother in the head several times. The younger boy ended up dying in the hospital of severe head trauma--and yet, even though their mother dragged her feet in seeking medical attention, it's the 12-year-old who's on trial for first-degree murder.
When Biannela Susana came home and found her two-year-old son, David Galarraga, unconscious, the first thing she did was go online.
The first Internet search about head trauma happened at 10:54 a.m.
Someone used one of two laptops in Biannela Susana's apartment to look up content about when a person "gets knocked out."
Then hours passed before someone Googled "concussions on children" at 2:38 p.m.
Around the same time, there was a search on the Toshiba laptop for "unconscious for hours."
At 3:07 p.m. someone looked up info for St. Luke's Hospital in Jacksonville.
The Web surfing on that laptop ended at 4:05 p.m. No one did any similar Internet searches on an HP laptop police also found in the home that day.
Susana didn't bring David to the hospital until 5:25 pm. Doctors later said that had David come to the hospital sooner, he would have survived. The only care of any sort that he got before then was ice packs on his head. And yet, Susana only stands charged with manslaughter--while her eldest son, 12-year-old Cristian Fernandez, is charged with first-degree murder as an adult, a charge that carries a life sentence. He is believed to be the youngest person in Jacksonville history, and one of the youngest in American history, to be charged with first-degree murder--unless we persuade the authorities to change their minds.
Even more outrageous, Cristian's past history pretty much screams that he shouldn't have been left alone with David--a responsibility that, to my mind, falls on the mother's shoulders.
According to court documents, this wasn't the first time that David was injured at the hands of Fernandez. The 2-year-old victim suffered a broken leg in January that was initially blamed on a fall from a jungle gym. Court records show that Susana later admitted to the Florida Department of Children and Families that she lied to investigators and that Fernandez broke his younger brother's leg while wrestling with the boy.
Police said Susana continued to allow Fernandez to baby-sit his younger brother.
Duval County State's Attorney Angela Corey says that based on the evidence, she had no choice but to charge Cristian with first-degree murder. However, if anything, the facts only support a charge of manslaughter on Cristian.
Somebody should be up on murder charges, all right--but it sounds like it should be Susana, not Cristian. Sign this petition urging Corey to reconsider her decision to charge Cristian with murder.