A 41-year-old man from California is facing charges of murder, torture, and child abuse after allegedly beating a 6-year-old boy to death for wetting his pants at a park, according to authorities.
Ernest Lamar Love, 41, from Placentia, California, is accused of killing Chance Crawford, the boy he was babysitting, following an incident at the park, as reported by LAW & CRIME.
Prosecutors allege that Love used a “large piece of raw lumber” to fatally beat the boy, leading to his death. Love was responsible for Chance’s care while the boy’s mother worked an overnight shift as a nurse’s assistant at St. Joseph’s Hospital.
The mother dropped Chance off at Love’s barbershop around 6:30 p.m. on August 29, according to the Orange County District Attorney’s Office.
Hours later, Love took the severely injured child to Children’s Hospital of Orange County (CHOC). Doctors at CHOC found that much of Chance’s flesh was missing from his buttocks, exposing raw, gaping wounds, alongside a subdural hematoma, extreme brain swelling, and other injuries indicative of violent shaking, prosecutors stated.
Chance remained in critical condition at the hospital until his death on Tuesday.
Surveillance video showed Love returning to his barbershop with a distressed Chance and carrying a large piece of wood, authorities said. Love allegedly used the wood to beat the boy, then poured hydrogen peroxide on his open wounds before forcing him to do physical exercises like push-ups, sit-ups, and jumping jacks.
After Chance collapsed, Love drove him to the hospital rather than calling 911, officials said.
Love is being held without bail at the Orange County Jail and has pleaded not guilty to the charges. If convicted, he faces 32 years to life in prison.
Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer has pledged to seek justice for Chance, emphasising that the boy’s life was precious and that such an atrocity should not have occurred at the hands of someone entrusted with his care.
“While his new classmates were celebrating the end of the first week of first grade, Chance’s seat in his classroom was empty as he fought for his life in a hospital bed,” Spitzer said in a statement. “Words cannot describe the sheer terror this little boy endured—at the hands of someone who was supposed to protect him, not torture him to death.”
Friends and family have remembered Chance as a “sweet little boy with a beautiful smile” who enjoyed watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Sesame Street. A GoFundMe page set up to support the family describes him as a talented artist with a bright future.
“He was a gifted child with so much life ahead of him,” the fundraiser reads. “We’re devastated by the loss of our beautiful, sweet, kind, bright, and shining star. This pain is unbearable, and our family will never recover from this loss.”
As the legal process unfolds, the community is grappling with the tragic loss of a young life taken far too soon, keenly awaiting justice for the six-year-old.
