WHITESBURG, Ky. — A Letcher County man is in jail, after a 7-month-old showed up in the emergency room with symptoms consistent with shaken baby syndrome.
Police were called to Whitesburg ARH Dec. 10, after staff determined the child had symptoms of a brain bleed.
The child’s mother had left the baby with her boyfriend, Cody Tucker, 30, of Whitesburg, while she took her three other children to a birthday party.
Tucker told police that the baby had been sick and he had laid him down in a bassinet, but found him unresponsive when he went to check on him sometime later. He told police he shook the baby and patted its back to try to get the child to respond.
Preliminary medical results released Dec. 13 showed the baby to have bleeding between the skull and brain on the left, right and rear of the head; bleeding in the back of both eyes; bruising to the chest wall and heart; and decreased left side movement due to brain injury. The police report notes the injuries are all consistent with “extreme force and shaking of a baby.”
Tucker was arrested Dec. 13 and charged with first-degree assault, a felony punishable by 10-to-20 years in prison. He is being held in the Letcher County Jail on a $1 million cash bond.
