A 2-year-old girl was beaten to death in South Philadelphia, police say. Her mother’s boyfriend is under arrest.
The child, Key’Monnie Bean, was not breathing when police arrived at her home, authorities said.
A 2-year-old girl was beaten to death in South Philadelphia last week, authorities say, and three people have been charged in connection with the crime.
The girl, Key’Monnie Bean, may have been subjected to abuse before the fatal beating on Dec. 8, Assistant District Attorney Ashley Toczylowski said at a news conference Thursday.
“There are indications this was an ongoing situation this little girl had to endure,” she said.
That night, police were called to a home in the 2100 block of South Beechwood Street for a report of an unresponsive child. When officers arrived, they found the girl lying on the floor of the basement, police said. She was not breathing, and bruises covered her body, Toczylowski said.
Efforts to revive the child were unsuccessful, said Deputy Commissioner Frank Vanore. She was pronounced dead shortly before 10 p.m. at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
Prosecutors are still awaiting a medical examiner’s report, Toczylowski said, but preliminary evidence suggests the child may have been beaten with objects and her airway restricted, causing suffocation. Her death has been ruled a homicide.
Sean Hernandez, also known as Raafi Gorham, the boyfriend of the toddler’s mother, was arrested Wednesday and charged with murder, police said. Gorham, 21, lives at the house where the girl was found, Toczylowski said.
Gorham’s cousin, Anthony Lowrie, 21, and Alycia McNeill, 20, were also arrested Wednesday and charged with obstruction and lying to police, Toczylowski said. Lowrie is additionally charged with giving police a fake identification. Toczylowski said the two provided conflicting and false accounts of what occurred that evening. Both live in West Passyunk.
“Everyone in that house was very reluctant” to speak with police, she said, though someone in the house had called 911.
Key’Monnie’s mother was home at the time of the alleged beating, Toczylowski said, but has not been charged in the incident.
The girl’s father, TaShaun Walls, declined to comment Thursday, citing his grief.
In a public Facebook post, Walls wrote: “I love you so much [and] miss you so much already just wish I would has been there faster but I’ll never forget you.”