Man uses cattle prod on newborn girl; pleads guilty but mentally ill
Your guess is as good as mine. He pleads guilty but mentally ill. I guess when the judge asks you, you can now plead guilty, not-guilty or guilty but mentally ill.
The abuse took place as early as four days after the baby girl was born. In addition to being cattle prodded, she suffered severe injuries such as multiple breaks to her left leg, broken forearm, multiple skull fractures as well as miscellaneous facial injuries. This all happened between the short timeframe of September 11 and October 31.
Of course this man is claiming mental illness, as seems to be the trend these days. Though, he does seem to be genuinely ill, he should have his procreation privileges revoked. It’s cases like this that makes me pro chemical castration.
The judge might allow him to be transferred immediately to a mental institution. Fortunately the judge will be forcing him to serve out his remaining sentence in jail when he exits the facility.
Tags: cattle-prod, metal-illnessRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Uncategorized
29 opinions for Man uses cattle prod on newborn girl; pleads guilty but mentally ill
Kathy
May 3, 2007 at 5:36 am
So he says he’s mentally ill? No shit Sherlock! You have to have some degree of mental illness to use a cattle prod on a newborn. Maybe they should come up with a clinical diagnosis of “a just plain evil bastard.” Not every mentally ill person out there commits horrible crimes like this. Being mentally ill should not be used as an excuse - especially when the perpetrator is the one that comes up with it. I hope he gets treatment alright. I think a cattle prod and numerous broken bones should “cure” him of his “illness.” Scummy piece of shit.
Peach
May 3, 2007 at 5:52 am
Once again, where’s the mother or others to stop his behavior? The child is in foster care, so obviously some steps have been taken to remove the mother from the day to day role.
NIKKI
May 3, 2007 at 6:24 am
HERE IS WHAT I FOUND ON THIS GUY!!!Somerset County — Reports show, a father, who told police he stunned his newborn daughter with an electric prod and smashed her head off of a sink, was also abused as a child.
Court documents show Brandon Austill was sexually assaulted by a family member, physically and mentally abused by his parents and lived in squalor.
Austill’s parents were stripped of their parental rights while he was a young teen. Later, court documents from the Court of Appeals in Jackson, Tenn., showed his parents attempted to regain custody of their six children in 1999.
According to the documents, Austill and his brother slept in the basement of their home where a hole in the wall allowed standing water to form on the floor.
A family counselor said Austill and another family member were repeatedly neglected, physically abused and sexually assaulted by an uncle.
The final portion of the document said the children’s many physical and mental deficiencies were too numerous and varied to list.
Austill was arraigned this week on more than 30 charges of physical abuse upon his own baby, including poking her with an electric prod when the infant wouldn’t stop crying.
Through their investigation, police also uncovered Austill’s MySpace.com account, which was full of dark entries. One posting said, “I see it happen, yet do nothing… I can’t fix it alone. I have no one to help me.”
Somerset Borough Police Chief Randy Cox said, “We are aware that parental rights were severed by the state of Tennessee for (Austill) and his siblings … but that has no bearing on our part of the investigation.”
Cox also said police have been told of, but have not confirmed, allegations of drug abuse by Austill.
Cox urged residents to contact authorities the moment they notice someone may be abusive or using drugs in order to possibly avoid incidents such as this.
NIKKI
May 3, 2007 at 6:26 am
THIS WAS THE FIRST REPORT!!! HE IS A JERK!Somerset County — In what’s being called the worst case of child abuse in Somerset County, a local man admitted he stunned his infant daughter with an electric prod and smashed the baby’s head off of a sink.
Brandon Austill, 21, of Somerset Borough, faces dozens of charges after his arrest at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.
Somerset Borough Police Chief Randy Cox said Austill told police he threw the 7-week-old baby girl in the bathtub twice and used an electric stunning prod to get her to stop crying.
Cox said Austill and the baby’s mother took the infant to Somerset Hospital for injuries in October. Cox said medical providers discovered the baby girl had a fractured skull in two places, multiple leg breaks, cuts and bruises.
Medical providers airlifted the infant to Children’s Hospital in Pittsburgh and alerted Children and Youth Services in addition to calling police.
Upon further investigation, medical staff determined the baby’s injures were in different stages of healing, indicating the abuse happened over a period of time.
When police questioned Austill and his live-in girlfriend, Austill said he couldn’t get the baby to stop crying so he smashed the infant’s head off of a sink and table. Austill also said he threw the infant in the bathtub and stunned the baby with an electric prod.
The infant’s mother has not been charged.
Austill remains in the Somerset County Prison on $75,000 bond. He is not permitted to have contact with the infant or her mother.
NIKKI
May 3, 2007 at 6:29 am
CHECK OUT WHAT GRANNY —HIS MOM— HAD TO SAY!!!!Child abuse suspect’s mom feared for baby
SOMERSET — Two weeks ago, Linda Austill said she spoke by telephone with her son, Brandon.
Always a troubled youth and once a ward of the state of Tennessee, Brandon Austill’s excitement over the birth of his daughter in early September was tempered by what his mother described as a “lost” tone in his voice.
Fearing the worst for the young girl, Linda Austill said she pleaded with her son to come home.
“I had a feeling something would happen to the baby,” she said in a telephone interview from her home in Mason, a small town in western Tennessee.
It did.
In what Somerset police describe as perhaps the most malicious case of child abuse they’ve ever seen, Brandon Austill, 21, is charged with breaking his 7-week-old daughter’s leg, fracturing her skull and twice shocking her with a stun gun – all since she was just 4 days old.
Austill has admitted to the crimes, telling police he could not get the girl to stop crying.
He is in the Somerset County Jail in lieu of $75,000 bond, awaiting a preliminary hearing before District Judge Art Cook of Somerset.
After being treated at Children’s Hospital in Pittsburgh, the baby is in foster care.
Borough police said the investigation is continuing. No charges have been filed against the girl’s mother, who police said indicated she wasn’t home when the torture was occurring.
Linda Austill said she lost custody of her six children eight years ago for what Tennessee authorities described as deplorable living conditions. She said her son has severe mental problems.
She alleged that he routinely cuts himself and is hooked on “whatever drugs he can steal.” On Myspace.com, Brandon Austill repeatedly references blood and gothic horror.
A day after his daughter was taken to the hospital, Austill’s last blog entry on the Web site said: “I see the problem. I can’t fix it alone. I have no one to help me.”
“He’s just death waiting to happen,” his mother said. “It sounds morbid for a mother to say, but he’s waiting for somebody to kill him. I don’t think he gives a … about anybody or anything.”
Linda Austill said her son moved to Somerset a year ago, after meeting his girlfriend, Briana Dawn Clark, over the Internet.
While Brandon Austill never was in serious trouble with the law, court records show, he was cited in late August for openly carrying a BB gun on a borough street.
Linda Austill cried as she thought about her granddaughter.
“I’ve never seen my grandbaby,” she said.
Ihavekidstoo
May 3, 2007 at 6:50 am
OK, so he was abused as a child. Why is that always the excuse/justification adult abusers use? “I was abused as a child.” SO WHAT! How does someone else’s bad behavior justify his own? I have a close family member who was horrifically abused by her father as a child. She overcame the tragedy of her childhood and became a wonderful mother and an inspirational human being. You know what? There are far more people like her - who overcome childhood adversity, who refuse to use their experience of abuse as justification for them to abuse others - than there are like this sorry piece of crap. His whole family sounds like they have mental problems. I just pray to God that the courts have the sense NOT to give that baby back to any of them. There are droves of loving, responsible families waiting in line to adopt precious babies like her.
Kathy
May 3, 2007 at 6:55 am
I can’t believe that grandmother would even have the audacity to show her face. I hope she NEVER gets to see that baby. Its obvious she wasn’t mother of the year herself.
Sorry to ear he was abused. You would think it would make himm even more determined to keep his children from suffering the same fate. Too bad. He chose to continue the cycle. I still believe he should be punished severely. He’ll get no pity from me.
NIKKI
May 3, 2007 at 7:03 am
CO-SIGNING WITH I HAVE KIDS AND KATHY!
shauna olsen
May 3, 2007 at 8:14 am
I guess now we should hope and pray that she is put into a good home where she will be loved and cared for, and not a home where the abuse will be repeated…but alas as we have seen that happens alot too. One can only hope this shit bag will not try to gain custody of her when he gets out of jail!!!!
Delilah n Detroit
May 3, 2007 at 9:40 am
WHERE IN THE FUCK WAS THE STUPID ASS MOTHER OF THIS BABY GIRL? SHE IS AS MUCH TOO BLAME AS HE.
REVENGE WOULD BE SO SWEET!! BUT DOUBLE THE PLEASURE. DO THEM THE SAME WAY, TWICE OVER!!!
April
May 3, 2007 at 10:01 am
Are there really women so clueless that they get involved with these men and don’t know that they are mentally disturbed. My thinking is that the mother is equally as fucked up. Why else would she allow this to happen??? She should be held accountable as well!! I am with Kathy in that he is beyond mentally ill and is truly an evil bastard. WTF is this world coming to?!?!?!?!
Robot B9
May 3, 2007 at 1:18 pm
So the chain continues. He was abused so he abuses his daughter and then someday she will abuse her baby? Is this how it has to be?
Maybe, just maybe with lots of help this baby could break the chain in this family anyway. Help like this would be very expensive and might take most of her life. A significant investment to be sure. But think about it, in a single generation, in this family anyway, the abuse might be stopped. Would it be worth it? Yes!
Renee
May 3, 2007 at 1:34 pm
The grandmother knew, as it takes one to know one…the mother knew, tell me a mother of a newborn who doesn’t know its been injured, get teh f*&^%ck out of her with that bullshit. She should be arrested! And if his myspace page was like that imagine his personality and character to even have a girlfriend, what she doesn’t know he’s insane. Of course she knows him. He may be handicapp, that is why anyone who knew him who didn’t report this or who would even allow him alone with a baby should be jailed right along with him. Maybe the mother is just like him…the baby is in foster care, which probably won’t last long, the wonderful justice system will give her back. Poor little baby girl, may god be and stay with her, please please don’t give her back…….
alalee
May 3, 2007 at 1:34 pm
This is gonna sound ugly, but here goes MY opinion.
Yet another child sacrificed to the profit margin of Big Pharma. When will people wake up and realize we as a society ALLOW this kind of thing to happen by allowing the legislature to back Big Pharma and the pushing of drugs on the masses and making it “okay” to be mentally ill? Even the APA has admitted they have no biological basis for deeming someone is mentally ill, it’s all based on the observations of the shrink (and the same patient could see 5 different shrinks and walk away with 5 different diagnoses). For one perspective on how psychiatry works, check out the Thud Experiment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment
For more on what a member of THEIR OWN COMMUNITY thought about American Psychiatric Association:
http://www.moshersoteria.com/resig.htm
I’d wager a paycheck that 99.9% of those who claim they are mentally ill are only doing so for one of a couple reasons:
1. They don’t want to own up to responsiblity for what they’ve done.
2. They want to collect Disability.
3. Somebody’s pinned them with that label because they tried to be a “free thinker” or a “rebel” and family/friends/psychiatrists/the court system wanted them to be “compliant” and “not make waves” and/or didn’t want to deal with someone who might have their own opinion.
The people like this pile of feces are only making people who truly suffer from mental illness LOOK LIKE A JOKE!
As for the mother, HOW CAN YOUR BABY BE ABUSED FOR SIX WEEKS - SIX WEEKS!!!! - AND YOU NOT NOTICE IT? Gimme a break! She needs to have her can sitting in jail just like he does.
Michelle G.
May 3, 2007 at 6:50 pm
While I am sure it will help show that abuse is handed down in generations (all the more reaont to stop/prevent it) I am afraid that relying on the “he was abused too!” as a defense (and the defense will use that in his case) is just going to make it harder in the future for those of us who suffered child abuse but who GOT HELP and who are raising healthy children to be left alone. Like there isn’t enough prejuduce already - this guy was more than just a former abuse victim, he was a total asshole with no urge to help himself at all.
His mother says he is just waiting for someone to kill him? Well, so am I. He deserves whatever hell he is put through.
Meg
May 4, 2007 at 2:56 pm
How awful this is…it’s really terrible to think of what went through these poor little babies…these kids are scared for life…for LIFE…no one could ever recover from these atrocitites…we are just now begining to understand the damage trauma does to the brain…what a horrid cycle…I am a social worker and bounce between feeling for the original victim (the “father”) and wanting him to rot in hell…with a cattle prod in his ass…
Robot B9
May 4, 2007 at 4:34 pm
Meg: Impossible to recover or just very difficult? So what can be done?
Teresa
May 4, 2007 at 9:18 pm
I believe in these cases someone needs to have balls enough to show him what this child went through.
Break his leg and poke him with a electric cattle prod. I don’t understand this justice system that won’t allow the perpetrator to feel exactly what he or her dished out. I can’t think of a better deterrent, not even jail. Although I believe he shouldn’t ever see the like of day again/
childadvocate
May 5, 2007 at 12:00 am
With my third daughter born FIVE weeks ago i can only say TEACH and RAISE: COMPETENT AWARE EDUCATED (school and life)SELF-RELIANT children! It is our only hope. As they will grow up (hopefuly) to choose like minded companions. And when you see that things just don’t seem right with your child……..Seek profesional help as people who have disorders, delays and even a history of horrific abuse Raise wonderful healthy children.
Meg
May 6, 2007 at 8:13 pm
Robert, it really depends on the “resiliency” of the kid…you can’t predict that..I have a set of siblings I work with..the girl at 21 is barely functioning and is receiving SSDI as her PTSD is so bad…her brother attends a day treatment program at 16, but mostly for his off the wall ADHD…yet, he can work and is OK…
Is it impossible to recover? Somtimes…sometimes it isn’t…
Susan
May 8, 2007 at 4:33 am
Court documents show Brandon Austill was sexually assaulted by a family member, physically and mentally abused by his parents and lived in squalor.
This is BS! I grew up the same way, and now have PTSD clinically diagnosed; but have NEVER EVER harmed anyone. Just because you have a shitty childhood does not ever give you the right or a pass on something like this!
kari
May 8, 2007 at 6:22 am
I absolutly agree with you. Having a bad childhood does not give anyone an excuse to treat their own children that way. Children do not asked to be brought into this world, thats a parents choice. This poor baby was 4 days old when this began. What on earth does an infant do to be slammed into a sink or bath? This story is sick. I hope this baby can recover, and never has to look at that man again, he doesn’t deserve that sweet, precious little girl!
natkirk
May 8, 2007 at 11:24 am
Instead of providing welfare money to folks too poor or incompetent to raise children, why not give money to them early on to not have children? If 14 year old girls were offered $200 cash and $1000 for college or beauty school after HS graduation for receiving a Norplant, would they take the deal?
If 14 year old boys were offered the same for vasectomies, would they take it?
And if parental notification is a prerequisite, why not? Do we really want the kids of a kid whose parents would sell his/her fecundity for $200? Just require an interview of the kid to make sure they are consenting.
cordelia15
May 10, 2007 at 12:22 pm
I am sickened by what this man did and by what was done to him. Our legislators mouth off about family values; what about this family’s values? Rather than a system that supports even a rotten family’s right to raise kids, we have to try to develop systems that support taking care of kids. If the father had received proper care, maybe this wouldn’t have happened. I am NOT saying he is not responsible for his actions; I am saying that if his being abused had been identified earlier, and if he had received proper treatment, the cycle could have been broken a generation ago. Also, the more we learn about genetics the more we learn some responses are “hard-wired.” So one abused person is hard-wired to survive damaged but decent, while another one is hard-wired to repeat the cycle, and treatment programs have to have more than a one-size-fits-all approach. Punishing offenders is just one arm of a comprehensive program to really help our kids. Start by urging legislators to fund programs that help, or at least not underfund existing social service systems.
miajemell
Aug 23, 2007 at 6:48 am
You know….I’m gonna need for these idiotic parents who love to torture defenseless children to be imprisoned for life NEVER EVER being able to get parole! What are they thinking? This man is nuts alright, but let me give him multiple skull fractures and several broken bones and cattle prod him and see how he likes it! WHERE WAS THE MOTHER?????
rockdoll_71
Oct 18, 2007 at 9:34 pm
OH, I am so pissed reading this. Isn’t it convenient that he is “mentally ill”? How about this- he is just PURE EVIL. God, I hope he NEVER GETS OUT OF PRISON. Piece of shit..
rockdoll_71
Oct 18, 2007 at 9:36 pm
Does anyone know how the baby is doing? PLEASE tell me she is alive.
Mr_Parker
Jan 20, 2008 at 9:25 am
There are people who commit child abuse who have never been abused, they just cracked in the head.
donnam
Jan 20, 2008 at 2:02 pm
http://www.tribune-democrat.com/local/local_story_315235133.html?keyword=topstory
The baby is in foster care and still alive apparently his mother was in fear that something bad was going to happen..
You must log in to post a comment.