Baby’s ‘father’ says mother repeatedly makes videos of herself abusing the child  

A man who says he is allegedly the father of the child who was being abused in videos that began circulating on social media on Tuesday, has told iWitness News it is not the first time such videos were made of the child.

The videos are believed to have been recorded in Vermont on Saturday, allegedly by the child’s 26-year-old mother and sent to the man, who lives overseas.

In one of the videos, the screaming girl, who is around age 3, has what appears to be a sheet wrapped around her neck and tied with a knot.

The child rolls around on what appears to be a bed as she attempts to free herself even as an adult female voice says something about “this life here”, her words drowned out by the child’s screaming.

The child continues to scream and attempts to free herself as the 30-second video ends.

In another video, which is also 30 seconds long, the child is lying on the same surface, with another piece of clothing wrapped around her neck.

She cries as the female voice says, “The dunce person have to mind your child, tek care ah her. Do de best she can to she.

“You want me to take care of your child and you living your best life happy and feeding your f***ing life? Boy ah go kill this f***ing child…” the voice says as the child cries and tries to free herself.

The voice continues: “I bet and believe because I know why. Is like the cycle repeating itself over and over. No changing. You understand? You want me show wah me cud do? See dah dey round ye neck? Slightly … lock um off slowly… Leh me show you.”

Police place child in foster care

In a statement Tuesday evening, Police said the child has been removed from her home and placed in foster care, where she will receive the necessary treatment and care.

The release said that officers were in the process of apprehending the suspect.

However, iWitness News was informed during a trip to Vermont Tuesday night that the mother of the child had been taken into police custody.

The police statement said officers from the Criminal Investigations Department have opened an investigation into the very disturbing videos.

“Anyone with information that can assist this investigation is asked to call 999/911 or contact the Criminal Investigations Department at 1-784-457-1211 ext. 483, any police officer you are comfortable speaking with, or the Police Station nearest to you. All information received would be treated confidentially,” the statement said.

Family concerned about mother for years

During our visit to Vermont on Tuesday, the child’s grandparents and an uncle, who live in a house in another part of the village, were distraught as they spoke to iWitness News about the incident.

They said that the woman is the mother of two children, the other being a boy who is around 6 years old.

The woman’s father, who said he has significant health challenges, cried as he spoke to iWitness News, saying that while he had heard what had happened, he had not imagined what he later saw in the video.

The family said they had been concerned about the woman for some time, adding that she had “thrown herself off” her secondary school a few years ago.

A source familiar with that incident, told iWitness News that while a student at the school a number of years ago, the woman had jumped from the first to the ground floor of the school in an apparent attempt to self-harm.

The source said that as a student, the woman was very calm but could be very erratic when agitated.

The woman’s younger brother, told iWitness News on Tuesday that he used to live in the same house as she and her children, but moved back in with their parents about a year ago because of his sister’s behaviour.

Abuse ‘reoccurring for a while’

Meanwhile, the man who said he is allegedly the father of the child who was being abused told iWitness News that the child’s mother sent him the videos while making another demand for money.

“Every single time she calls me and asks me for something, if I can’t afford to send it to her or we have a disagreement or anything happens, she always does abusive videos to the child — put a bag over the child’s head or stifle the child or hit the child and do a live video and send it to me,” the man told iWitness News.

He said this has been “reoccurring for a while.

“But what happened is that I found that [Saturday] night it got to me in a way that kind of broke me down that I couldn’t take it anymore.”

He said the child’s mother was “going so hard on the child that I actually sent the video to her sister.

“Because, normally, what she would do, she would send me the video then she would quickly delete it.”

The man told iWitness News that on Saturday, he saved the video and sent it to the woman’s sister and pleaded for immediate assistance for the child.

He said the woman’s sister, who is based in the Grenadines, sent it to another family member and the child’s maternal grandmother was informed and went to the house.

“I tried to contact anybody in the neighbourhood that would go to this child’s aid. When I called her (the child’s mother) back on the phone, she told me ‘The child Dead already.’ Don’t call she no more, she done kill the child; the child dead.

“I started screaming. I hold my head. I started crying, I started panicking; I was trying everything to help.”

The man told iWitness News that the child’ aunt later told him that the police were at the house and the child was alive.

“I begged and begged and asked them not to let the child stay with her. Anyhow, I was told that they took the child from her and I was in contact with the sister and the rest of the family.”

The man said that normally after receiving these videos he would try to talk to the woman.

“I would go and send whatever I got to send but this time it just got to me to a place where I couldn’t take it anymore.”

He said that he supports the child although her mother has repeatedly told him that he is not the father.

“…her family had told me ever since that she [was] pregnant before she came to see me. And she, in the early stages of the pregnancy, had told me is not mine.

“I’m just being real with you as a man. If I never went there, my name would never get called. So, I blame myself for that. I’ve never taken a DNA test,” he told iWitness News.

‘She has to go to jail’

The man said he is a contract worker across the region, but only works when he lands a contract.

“I send her money in October? I didn’t send in November because I had no work. December is the last time I sent her Christmas money …  at the end of December,” he told iWitness News.

He said he plans to go to the money transfer agency for proof of the amount of money he has sent to the woman to help support the child.

He told iWitness News that having sent money to the woman at the end of December, it would be reasonable for the woman to wait until the end of January to demand more money from him.

“I tell her just give me a couple of days or whatever. But anytime I tell her these things, … she just goes into this abusive mode and just wants to send you all kinds of videos like she’s killing this child.

“I normally just  hold but I couldn’t hold it no more,” he said, adding that he would like the woman to be charged.

“She has to go to jail. She cannot be doing an innocent child that,” he said, adding that if there is a trial, there would be more evidence of the woman abusing the child.

He said he is always concerned about the welfare of the child and the only reason he sent the video was to show the urgency of the situation.

“I will send you the full thing of the WhatsApp message where I told [name omitted] more than once I don’t want this video on the internet because this child is an innocent child and once you put it on the internet it will not come off.”

He said that despite the assurances he was given, the video still ended up on the internet.

“But I tell myself that God’s work is more powerful than man’s and if it was supposed to happen so for her to stop because if it didn’t go down that road, who knows? The next time she does it she might end up killing that child.

“But I have all the evidence in my phone that I told people I don’t want this on the internet. In fact, the first time I sent it to [name omitted], I sent it as a disappearing video.”

‘sickly’ child

And, the child’s maternal grandmother told iWitness News that the child is “sickly” but a very nice baby, who cannot even speak well as yet.

“She born sickly; real sickly. She went through real things,” the grandmother said.

She said the child had been at her house for most of Saturday and she carried her back to her mother after she returned from town.

The grandmother, who has her own health challenges, said she went to the house after she heard her daughter was abusing the child.

She said when she got to the house, the door was locked so she banged on it and told her daughter to open up and asked her what she was doing.

“She run and come out fast and open the door. And I went in. She was telling me to come out of her house. I said, ‘The house is not yours’ it is my house and you are my daughter. I just leave you down there to live because your daddy lives by his mother’s house because she died…”

The grandmother said she did not know the extent of what her daughter had done to the baby.

She said that when she got to the house, the baby was sleeping.

“She played all day,” the grandmother told iWitness News.

She said that when she brought out the child, the child’s mother told her she did not want her (the grandmother) at the house.

The grandmother told iWitness News that the police told her (the grandmother) to leave.

“I don’t even know when they carried the child because I was so weak,” she said.

The child’s maternal grandfather, speaking with tears streaming down his face, told iWitness News that the video was really distressing “because I dey here all the time sick. I sick no r***cloth. I can’t even go out. I can’t even walk. Sometimes I go down there, my feet get weary, I have to go back and sit down.”

The couple said they did not know where their grandson was and speculated that he was with his father, who lives in St. Vincent.  

The alleged abuser’s brother told iWitness News that she has been behaving erratically for “real long.

“Ever since she got the first child…” he said, adding that his sister was “taking on man stress…
“She sent the video to her boyfriend. I don’t know what that intention is. That is foolishness,” he said.

“I feel real sad when I saw that video. My head raised… I had to delete the video because I can’t watch the video. The video is upsetting me. I ain’t expect that from my sister,” he told iWitness News.