Patrick Parnel sat stoically as a detective testified that Parnel admitted hitting his hours old baby daughter in the head with a tire iron and leaving her in the brush of a vacant lot.
The testimony of Grays Harbor Sheriff’s Office Chief Criminal Deputy Steve Shumate came Thursday on the third day of Parnel’s first degree murder trial. Parnel, 23, faces life in prison if convicted. He allegedly helped his girlfriend, Brittany Taylor, give birth to their child in an Ocean Shores motel room, took the baby from the motel and hid it near the airport. Taylor has testified that she and Parnel thought the baby was dead when he left the motel.
Shumate told the courtroom that he interviewed Parnel at the Grays Harbor County Jail on April 8, 2013, five days after the infant’s body was found. Shumate testified that he told Parnel that he had seen the autopsy results and knew the baby’s head injury was too severe to be caused by being cut with scissors, as Parnel had told police. Shumate says Parnel continued to deny any wrongdoing.
Parnel was later transferred to the Sheriff’s office’s annex for more questioning. Shumate it was then that, Thomas Taylor, a forensic interviewer with the Children’s Advocacy Center in Montesano, left the room he was in with Parnel and told Shumate that Parnel “had something to tell us.”
According to Shumate, Parnel then told investigators that when he arrived near Fisher Avenue to hide the baby, he slipped when getting out of his vehicle and fell on the infant, who then started to cry. Parnel then took the baby to the woods to dispose of it. Parnel told Shumate that when walking back to his car, he couldn’t “bear to leave her like that,” and got a tire iron from his car and struck the baby in the head with the tool once.
Both Shumate and Taylor testified that they were surprised by the lack of emotion Parnel showed when talking about what happened. The two stated that Parnel kept referring to the baby as “it” during interviews and seemed to not have any reaction when shown pictures of the wounds to the infant’s head.
Marian Clark, a forensic scientist with the Washington State Patrol Crime Lab, examined the tire iron that prosecutors allege Parnel used to kill the infant. When questioned by Chief Deputy Prosecutor Katie Svoboda, Clark said the tool was tested for indications of blood, but none was found. Additionally, Clark tested the washrag that was hanging from a tree near the baby’s body when she was found and said the blood on the towel matched the DNA of the infant.
Steven Rostad is a neuropathologist who examined the brain of the infant and testified that hemorrhaging in the brain was consistent with trauma to the head, saying that “very significant force” needed to be used to cause the kind of injuries the child sustained. Rostad added that the baby was alive at the time of the trauma it sustained.
“For blood to get anywhere, you need a pump. For you to get blood of this extent, the heart has to be beating,” he said.
Further, Rostad explained that it is highly unlikely that the injuries the baby sustained would occur during the process of child birth or when the baby was being carried by Brittany Taylor, Parnel’s girlfriend.
“I have no knowledge of such severe hemorrhage or swelling inside of the womb. It would take enormous pressure to cause that injury.”
Taylor is serving a four and half year sentence for her part in the baby’s death.
Testimony ended before noon as Parnel’s defense attorney asked Judge Stephen E. Brown if the court could be recessed until Friday morning.
Robert Quillian explained that he wanted to discuss with his client the “various decisions he has to make” regarding the trial’s proceedings. Specifically, Quillian expressed to Brown that he didn’t want to rush things, given the severity of the case.
Brown allowed Quillian’s request and decided that proceedings will continue on Friday morning. The jury is expected to begin deliberations sometime Friday.
No comments:
Post a Comment