A baby severely injured last week at a home day care in South Weber died Tuesday night at Primary Children's Medical Center.
"This certainly heightens the speed for what our investigators need to do," Davis County Sheriff's Lt. Dan Horton said.The 3-month-old boy, whose identity has not been released, died after a March 29 incident at the home of day-care provider Geri Daines.
Daines told investigators she left the infant asleep on a bed and left the room. In the 10 minutes he was apparently alone with two 4-year-olds and a 3-year-old, the child somehow came off the bed and suffered severe head injuries.
Horton said one of the children told police the baby was pulled off the bed by another child. Preliminary information, however, indicates the type of injuries the baby received are too severe to be consistent with a simple fall, Horton said.
With the child's death Tuesday, Horton said it becomes unclear if the case will escalate from an assault to a homicide investigation.
Even if the children left in the room with the baby are determined to have caused the critical injuries, a criminal prosecution is out of the question because of their ages, Horton said.
That does leave investigators looking at possible criminal culpability in connection with Daines, who voluntarily shut down her business and is expected to surrender her license.
Daines, who has been in the day-care business since 1992, is legally allowed to have up to 16 children in her home, according to state licensing regulations. A single home day-care provider can care for up to eight children, but Daines had another full-time caregiver working for her in the home.
In December 1999, Daines was cited by license reviewers because she allowed four children to remain unattended while she was upstairs.
Department of Health spokesman Ross Martin said regulations prohibit leaving children unattended for any length of time. "You have to be within sight or hearing at all times."
Because of the citation, a surprise inspection was made at the home two months later to see if there was a recurrence of the problem. Martin said Daines was in compliance.
In addition to investigations by the state licensing agency and the Davis County Sheriff's Office, state child protective services investigators are looking into the death.