NYC couple charged with assault in boy's slaying

NYC couple charged with assault in boy's slaying
By KAREN MATTHEWS, Associated Press Writer
Mon Jun 9, 8:07 PM ET

NEW YORK - Two people have been charged with beating a 3-year-old boy who died in their care in a home just blocks from where a girl's brutal death in 2006 spurred calls for reform in the city's child-welfare agency.

Police and social workers had gone several times to the Brooklyn apartment where Kyle Smith lived but never saw any problems. Neighbors said they saw abuse, but never reported it.

Kyle was sodomized, beaten, doused with cold water and forced to do push-ups and march in place as punishment, according to court papers. His numerous injuries included a torn tongue, bruises to his back, buttocks, legs and scrotum, and lacerations inside his anus.

The boy was pronounced dead at a hospital Friday after police were called to the Brooklyn apartment where he lived with Nymeen Cheatham, 30, and her companion Lemar Martin, 25.

The death has been ruled a homicide. Cheatham and Martin were arrested Saturday and arraigned Sunday on charges including assault and endangering the welfare of a child. Prosecutors said in a criminal complaint that the pair confessed to police that they beat the boy.

Jonah Bruno, a spokesman for Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes, said charges against Cheatham and Martin could be upgraded following an investigation.

Martin's attorney, Spiro Ferris, did not return a call seeking comment Monday. Attempts to reach Cheatham's attorney, Joseph Miller, were unsuccessful.

Ferris and Miller argued for their clients to be released on bail Sunday because the top charge was assault. Supreme Court Justice John Walsh ordered them held without bail.

Neighbors told the Daily News that they saw the boy being abused and now regret failing to report it to authorities.

"Everyone could have said something but nobody did," Hason Parker told the paper. "Now this little boy is dead."

Parker said he once saw Cheatham screaming at Kyle outside in the cold. "It was 15 degrees and she had this heavy jacket on and he was in pajama shorts and a tank," Parker said. "The little boy was shivering and crying."

Police and social workers from the city's Administration for Children's Services had visited the home and reported no signs of abuse. Cheatham and Martin did not have legal custody of Kyle, but he was living with them after his drug-addicted mother gave him up last year.

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said officers were called to the home four times since late 2007, all for issues related to visitation with Kyle's biological father, Darien Smith.

Spokeswoman Sheila Stainback said the agency conducted a court-ordered investigation of the home last October after Cheatham filed for legal custody of Kyle.

"We found the house in order and the child happy and healthy at that time," she said.

Cheatham did not pursue legal custody, and the agency had no further official role in the matter.

Cheatham's and Martin's apartment is in Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant section, the same neighborhood where 7-year-old Nixzmary Brown was killed in January 2006.

Nixzmary's stepfather, Cesar Rodriguez, was sentenced last month to up to 29 years in prison in her death. Her mother faces a separate trial later this year. The scrawny and battered girl was bound to a chair, starved and forced to urinate in a litter box before she was killed with a fatal blow to the head.

That case shocked the city and created pressure for reforms. The agency hired 20 "protective agents" with previous law enforcement experience to serve as consultants and help caseworkers improve their investigative skills.

The city also started a campaign to try to get New Yorkers to "say something" and dial 311 if they suspect abuse.

Stainback said no one reported Cheatham or Martin for abuse.

"The terrible case of abuse involving Kyle Smith is deeply felt here at ACS," she said. "We are again asking neighbors, family and friends to call 311 (or 911 in an emergency) if they suspect child abuse or neglect."

I don't know what disgusts me more, the abusers or the people who knew what was happening and did nothing to stop it. In my mind they are just as guilty.

That's quite true. If I saw my neighbour forcing their kid outside half-naked in the freezing cold, I'd run up and deck them.

They definitely should have said something if they saw abuse. I can't believe how much this kid suffered. How people like this can have children is beyond me. I seriously believe in an eye for an eye. They should be tortured. I hate people like this.

It's sad you need a driver's license a marraige license, even a fishing license, but any fool can get a kid. I am curious though, who gave the kid to these monsters? The drugged up mother? Or the state?