Background: A section of the 5500 block of South Handley Street in Wichita, Kansas (Google Maps). Inset: Kevin Mitchell (Sedgwick County Sheriff”s Office).
A Kansas man accused of causing a 1-year-old child’s critical injuries said he was “swinging” the infant around when she “flew” out of his arms and hit her head.
Kevin Mitchell, 30, has been charged with child abuse, jail records show. He is being held in the Sedgwick County Jail under a $75,000 bond, and he has been there since Dec. 17.
Though the charge was leveled last month, new details have emerged in recent days.
According to a criminal affidavit filed in Sedgwick County district court, Mitchell was at a home on the 5500 block of South Handley Street in Wichita on Dec. 16. He was there watching three children — ages 2, 1, and 6 months — while their mother was out giving plasma.
At some point, the defendant was “spinning” with the 1-year-old girl in his arms when he “tripped on the bed,” fell onto it, and the girl “‘flew’ out of his arms toward the wall,” the court document reviewed by Law&Crime states. The child landed on the floor, and when he picked her up, he “noticed she was not breathing normally,” the affidavit said.
After a failed attempt of blowing “into her nose and then mouth to try to help her,” Mitchell brought the child to his mother — who also apparently lived in the home — and she told him to call 911.
First responders arrived at the scene at about 5:30 p.m., with a captain of the Sedgwick County Emergency Medical Services contacting the Wichita Police Department “since this did not appear to be a medical issue.” Detectives arrived to find the child “in the living room, on her back on top of the couch unresponsive,” police said. Her eyes were “fixed and dilated and did not respond to light.”
Mitchell told authorities that he had been “playing” with the child, but he denied that she had hit her head and said he did not know if she had fallen, the affidavit states. When the EMS captain took the child to the ambulance, “he observed a bruise on her left temple.”
The infant was also found to have had bruises on her left leg, stomach, and chest. She was placed in the pediatric intensive care unit of a nearby hospital in “extremely critical condition.”
Detectives continued investigating what happened, and they spoke to the child’s mother. She reportedly admitted to spanking her 1-year-old daughter and said that when she “must” physically discipline her kids, she “usually just slaps them with an open hand on the thigh.”
The woman also said that she once saw Mitchell discipline the infant “by grabbing her face around her mouth when she was not behaving.” The mother’s name was redacted from the document, and there was no indication she was or will be charged in the case.
Investigators also spoke with Mitchell several times. He allegedly admitted that the child victim was “acting normally” before he began “swinging” her around — and though he initially claimed ignorance as to how she hurt her head, he ultimately told officers about how she “flew” out of his arms and “struck her head on the windowsill/shelf.”
Mitchell is scheduled for a preliminary hearing on Feb. 2.
