A Wisconsin daycare worker has been charged breaking a 3-month-old girl’s arm when she slammed the child into her crib.
Ashley Karschnick, 32, denied being frustrated or slamming the baby into the crib, WBAY reported. Instead, she said, the rocking of the crib from side to side seen in surveillance video of the incident was caused when she bumped the crib with her hip.
The incident took place on October 13. Fond Du Lac Police were called to Children’s Wisconsin in Milwaukee when the little girl was brought there with a “minimal displaced spiral fracture of the mid left humeral diaphysis,” a criminal complaint said. A doctor at the hospital said the baby’s injuries was consistent with physical abuse.
Investigators went back to view the surveillance video from Lily Pad Day Care on that day and noted that Karschnick appeared to become “more and more frustrated” in the course of the day. At about 12:30 p.m., she picked up the baby by the torso and slammed the child into the crib “with enough force where you can see the side of the crib rock side to side and you can hear thump from the impact on the mattress.” The baby began to scream.
Karschnick went back to the crib a few minutes later, the complaint says, when she may have attempted to “starfish swaddle” the child. Detectives wrote in the complaint that the infant was screaming so loudly that she was gasping for air, noting that it sounded “like a blood-curdling scream.”
At this point, Karschnick took the baby out of crib and laid her on the floor, her left arm limp and not being used normally. She was still screaming.
When detectives spoke with her on October 16, Karschnick denied being frustrated or slamming the child into the crib and said the screaming was the same cry she was giving me,” and “I feel like every time I touched her she was crying.”
Police charged her with child abuse-recklessly causing harm. She appeared in court last week and was given a $2,500 bond. According to WLUK, she is barred from having contact with children under the age of 12 except her own. She is due in court again on Tuesday.
For the latest true crime and justice news, subscribe to the ‘Crime Stories with Nancy Grace’ podcast.
[Featured image: Ashley Karschnick/Fond du Lac County Jail]
