MOTT HAVEN, the Bronx (PIX11) — A Bronx dad was sentenced to 12 years in prison Tuesday after he fatally threw his infant son to the ground.
Christian Rodriguez, 27, pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the 2019 death of his 6-week-old son, Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark said. After his prison sentence, he faces five years of post-release supervision.
“The defendant’s newborn was crying and instead of comforting him, the defendant threw him to the ground, ending his life,” Clark said. “The defendant’s violence is unconscionable and unfitting of any parent.”
The dad initially told investigators he accidentally hit his son’s head on a bedroom doorframe, officials said. He later admitted he’d angrily thrown the baby boy to the ground.
“I got angry and threw Aiden to the ground face first,” Rodriguez said, according to the criminal complaint. “I got frustrated and threw him to the ground.”
They’d just gotten home from the baby’s grandmother’s home. She lived a few buildings over.
Aiden Rodriguez died from abusive head trauma. A scan found he suffered fractures to his skull, an acute subdural hemorrhage, a scattered left acute subarachnoid hemorrhage, a midline shift of the brain and bruising to both sides of the head.
Rodriguez was previously charged in a case involving his daughter. In 2015, he allegedly told police he “was getting frustrated” and dropped his infant daughter. She suffered bruising and swelling around the face and nose. Rodriguez was charged with reckless endangerment and endangering the welfare of a child at the time.
