A former babysitter who served a few months in jail for shaking a 5-month-old boy so forcefully 37 years ago that he suffered permanent brain damage now faces a possible life sentence after his death from those injuries in 2019, at age 35, the authorities said. Terry McKirchy, 59, who now lives in Texas, was arrested again on July 2 after a grand jury in Broward County, Fla., indicted her on a first-degree murder charge in the death of Benjamin Dowling, prosecutors said this week. She was taking care of him at her home in Hollywood, Fla., on July 3, 1984, when he had difficulty breathing, the authorities said. His mother told investigators that she immediately took him to a hospital, where doctors found that he had been shaken with such force that it had severed the blood vessels to his brain. Ms. McKirchy was sentenced to 60 days in jail and probation after pleading no contest in 1985 to charges of attempted murder and aggravated child abuse.

Source: New York Times July 27, 2021 23:00 UTC