A Minnesota father was sentenced Tuesday to 15 years in prison for the murder of his infant daughter which he initially blamed on his cat.
41-year-old Kristopher Dale Arlando Henderson pleaded guilty to felony unintentional second-degree murder in Blue Earth County District Court. According to the Post Bulletin, it was part of a plea deal that dismissed several other felonies, including manslaughter and malicious punishment of a child.
According to court records, Henderson was facing multiple charges for the November 2021 death of his 2-month-old daughter, stemming from injuries inflicted in September 2021.
Henderson was charged with second-degree unintentional murder, first-degree manslaughter, first-degree assault causing great bodily harm, and three counts of malicious punishment of a child.
A probable cause statement reads that police were alerted to a possible child abuse case on Sept. 24, 2021, after the 2-month-old girl was admitted to the hospital.
Hospital staff said the baby had brain hemorrhaging, broken ribs, broken femurs, and a torn frenulum, which is part of the tongue.
The child’s mother said the baby was fine when she left for work that morning, leaving the child with Henderson for the day. Upon returning home, the mother said the child was injured and brought her to the hospital.
The probable cause statement reads that Henderson told the mother, as well as authorities, that their 20-pound cat had laid on the baby and caused the injuries.
However, a doctor stated that the severity of the injuries could not have been caused by a cat.
“The 20-pound cat that father states was around the infant, is not the cause of these injuries,” the doctor wrote in his report, according to the probable cause statement.
The 2-month-old was put on life support with little to no brain activity and a “grim” chance of recovery. When the child did not improve after weeks, medical staff began end-of-life conversations with the child’s mother.
The baby died at the hospital on Nov. 3, 2021.
After numerous interviews with Henderson, he finally admitted to detectives that he cradled the baby “face down in his arms and struck her back more forcefully than usual for what he estimated was five minutes while trying to calm her down.”
According to the probable cause statement, detectives asked Henderson if he had struck the baby hard enough to break her ribs, and he said that he did.
Henderson had been in custody on a $1 million bail since his arrest in October 2021.
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