A man who faced 12 years in prison for child abuse for whipping his girlfriend’s 1-year-old child will serve no jail time.
The man, Cody Lyn Cantrell, 22, was granted a two-year judicial diversion on the charge of aggravated child abuse. He was warned to have no further contact with the victim and must undergo anger management. His criminal record will be erased after two years provided he gets into no more trouble.
Cantrell was charged after the toddler’s mother reported finding bruises on the child’s legs and a burn on her thigh. Sheriff’s investigator Kevin Murphy investigated the incident.
“When we first spoke, Mr. Cantrell claimed he had never spanked the girl,” Murphy testified during Cantrell’s preliminary hearing. “He then changed his story and said he had spanked her during breakfast.”
According to Cantrell’s version of events, the spanking came when the girl refused to eat her eggs, spitting them out on the floor several times.
“He said she threw a fit for about 20 minutes,” Murphy testified noting after several defiant instances Cantrell said he grabbed the girl and spanked her.
It was never explained how the burn mark got on the child’s thigh.
The sentence comes just days after a local mother was given 90 days in jail for slapping her daughter on the face. In that instance, the daughter was trying to break up an argument between the mother and her boyfriend when she was slapped.