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Jury begins deliberations in Davis child assault case

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WOODLAND — Did Darnell Dorsey fatally assault 20-month-old Cameron Morrison in an uncontrollable rage? Or was he a scapegoat for doctors and police officers who overlooked an illness that killed the Davis toddler?

Jurors heard both theories during closing arguments Monday in Yolo Superior Court, where Dorsey stands accused of causing Cameron’s death on Jan. 25, 2014.

Cameron Morrison was 20 months old when he died in January 2014. Courtesy photo

Cameron Morrison was 20 months old when he died in January 2014. Courtesy photo

“That boy died because of what the defendant did to him,” Deputy District Attorney Michelle Serafin said, dismissing the defense’s argument that a severe case of pneumonia led to Cameron’s demise.

Serafin said Cameron’s numerous injuries — bleeding and swelling to the brain, internal injuries and 18 fractured ribs in various stages of healing — “are the result of blunt-force trauma. …The medical evidence in this case is overwhelming, and it proves the defendant without a doubt killed him.”

Not so fast, said defense attorney Joseph Gocke, who contends that the evidence points just as easily to death by hypoxia — a shutdown of oxygen flow that occurred when Cameron’s pneumonia sent him into respiratory distress, which then led to cardiac arrest.

“In this particular case, you have a progression of (brain) swelling due to a number of particular events,” Gocke said in his closing remarks. Prosecutors “have not proven this case beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Dorsey, 24, is charged with assault on a child under 8 with force likely to cause great bodily injury resulting in death. However, jurors also may consider two lesser counts during their deliberations: assault with force likely to cause great bodily injury, and simple assault.

Darnell Dorsey appears in Yolo Superior Court to face charges in the death of his girlfriend's son, Cameron Morrison. Sue Cockrell/Enterprise photo

Darnell Dorsey appears in Yolo Superior Court to face charges in the death of his girlfriend’s son, Cameron Morrison. Sue Cockrell/Enterprise photo

Cameron, who was not Dorsey’s biological son, was hospitalized on the night of Jan. 22, 2014, after he and his older half-brother were in Dorsey’s care. Their mother, Veronica Rix, had been at a local gym and came home to discover the boy unconscious.

Serafin theorized that Dorsey fought with Rix earlier that night over leaving the house once again after working all day — a loss of temper that escalated as Cameron horsed around instead of eating his dinner.

“That frustration, that anger … results in him losing control, grabbing Cameron and violently beating and shaking him,” Serafin told the jury. When the boy became unresponsive, she added, Dorsey panicked — cleaning a split lip with tissues that police later found in the garbage, then creating a story that he had found Cameron unconscious and thought he was choking.

“The defendant knew he was going to have to explain how Cameron got into the condition he was in, so he came up with a cover story,” one that has evolved several times to fit the pneumonia theory, Serafin said.

But not one doctor, either at Sutter Davis Hospital or at the UC Davis Medical Center, detected any sign of a debilitating illness, Serafin noted. She highlighted the testimony of her star witness, Med Center neuropathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu, who backed the autopsy finding that Cameron’s injuries resulted from intentionally inflicted trauma.

“All of these doctors, who see the sickest of the sickest of the sickest kids on a daily basis, did not see pneumonia in Cameron’s lungs,” Serafin said.

Gocke, meanwhile, questioned why none of the family’s neighbors in the Olive Drive mobile home park heard any screaming or crying consistent with a prolonged beating.

He said it was because there was no argument that preceded Rix’s departure for the gym, and there was no violent assault that led to Cameron’s injuries.

Dorsey “could have done a better job of parenting on that evening,” Gocke said, acknowledging his client’s decision to smoke marijuana and leave the children unattended as they ate their dinner on the living room floor.

By then, Gocke claimed, pneumonia ran rampant through the toddler’s lungs, compromising his lungs to the point that he stopped breathing, and prompting Dorsey, his mother and paramedics to deliver repeated chest compressions that likely accounted for the boy’s rib fractures and other internal injuries.

The CPR then triggered a blood-flow surge that ruptured vessels already damaged by the lack of oxygen, causing hemorrhaging that doctors mistook for symptoms of child abuse and blindly accepted without exploring other possible explanations, the defense contends.

“It’s credible. It’s cogent. It adds up,” Gocke said before asking the jury to deliver a not-guilty verdict.

The six-man, six-woman jury received the case shortly after 3 p.m. and were expected to resume their deliberations today.

— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene


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