‘He was brutalized.’ Abington couple guilty of murder in beating death of boy, 4

In the last, sad hours of his life, prosecutors said, 4-year-old Tahjir Smith was frightened, deeply bruised, soaked in his own urine, and unable to sit up straight. He had been severely beaten and burned, they said, as punishment for spilling his cereal earlier on that January day last year.

On Thursday night, a Montgomery County jury found his mother, Lisa Smith, and her boyfriend, Keiff King, guilty of first-degree murder in the beating death of the child. His life came to a violent end after he told his mother of the spilled cereal on the morning of Jan. 22, 2018. Smith and King decided that Tahjir, who weighed just 42 pounds, needed to be disciplined: They beat him nearly to unconsciousness, then put him in the shower, which was running scalding water. It was only after Smith noticed that he was no longer alert, that his eyes had rolled to the back of his head, that she called 911.

Smith, 20, and King, 27, both of Abington, also were unanimously convicted of conspiracy to commit aggravated assault and endanger a child for what prosecutors called a “unfathomable” crime.

King sighed and dropped his head as the foreman read his verdict after three hours of deliberation.

Relatives burst into tears and Smith’s older sister, Brenda Pauline, stormed out of the courtroom.

“Don’t let them people do that,” Pauline shouted after the foreman read Smith’s verdict. A sheriff’s deputy guided her to the hallway.

Neither King nor Smith turned around from the defense table. As quietly they’d entered and exited the courtroom for the last two days during the trial, they rose from their seats Thursday — King in a gray sports coat and black slacks; Smith in a navy suit jacket and matching skirt — and walked out, hands shackled.

“He was brutalized over and over and over again,” First Assistant District Attorney Edward F. McCann Jr. said in his closing argument to the jury. “This is not discipline gone bad. You know this.”

As Tahjir lay dying, prosecutors said, Smith, then 19, bundled her son in winter clothes, walked a few blocks away as part of a cover story that she was coming from a bus stop, and called 911 to report her son was suffering an asthma attack. When the ambulance arrived, authorities said, she brusquely deposited her son’s body into the arms of a surprised paramedic and began to walk away.

“She never asked about Tahjir’s condition,” McCann said. “You know why she never asked? She knows he’s dead.”

Lawyers for Smith and King said there had been no murderous intent in the couple’s actions, describing their conduct as negligent and reckless.

Smith’s public defender, Carrie Allman, said her client — then six months pregnant with King’s child — loved Tahjir, but was overwhelmed caring for him and King’s two other children in a dirty, crowded Abington home.

King’s lawyer, Francis Genovese, told the jury of seven men and five women that charges of involuntary manslaughter and child endangerment were more appropriate than murder.

“What motive did Mr. King have to kill a 4-year-old child?" he asked. “Because he spilled cereal? Because he peed himself? It makes no sense.”

McCann, the prosecutor, called the possibility of an involuntary manslaughter verdict grossly below the standard of justice in Tahjir’s case.

“Let’s not sugarcoat it,” he said. They "beat him, repeatedly, as hard as they could.”

It was the culmination of violence against the boy that had been building for months, authorities said.

Tahjir, just a month from his fifth birthday, had 10 fractures on eight ribs and deep scars on his back that likely came from a belt whipping. Relatives had noticed a black eye. His mother admitted to dragging the child across the carpet in the past, leaving him with rug burn.

And on the day Tahjir died, prosecutors said, the abuse went even further.

The child’s bottom was severely swollen from having been beaten with a sandal dozens of times, said Ian Hood, a forensic pathologist who conducted Tahjir’s autopsy. The violence was so severe, he said, that fatty tissue ruptured in the child’s body, releasing toxins that leached into the bloodstream, and eventually caused the boy to go into shock.

Tahjir’s brain, too, was swollen, Hood said, both ears were bruised, and a shoulder displayed a fresh second-degree burn.

“He’s not taking a hot shower,” said McCann. “He’s getting burned by his mother and her boyfriend.”

As the lawyers spoke, Smith and King, who had known of each other before they struck up a romantic relationship in 2017, sat quietly at the defense table.

“She chose Keiff King over her child,” McCann said, emphasizing his next words. “Every single time.”

Smith and King are being held in the Montgomery County Correctional Facility without bail. Their sentencing date has yet to be scheduled.