Man jailed on suspicion of beating girlfriend’s 2-year-old

A man was arrested Thursday on suspicion of beating his girlfriend’s 2-year-old daughter, causing critical injuries, a Metropolitan Police Department arrest report shows.

Jose Ricardo Alamilla-Perez was arrested Thursday afternoon, the report said.

About 2:30 p.m. Tuesday, the child’s mother went to work, leaving her seven children, ages 2 to 12, in Alamilla-Perez’s care. When she returned from work about midnight, she said she noticed the 2-year-old and making strange sounds in her crib.

The mother noticed the baby had a bump on her head and bruises and was limp and unresponsive, the report said. She asked Alamilla-Perez what happened.

Alamilla-Perez told her that the child’s 9-year-old brother had bathed her and that the baby had fallen in the bathtub. The mother took the child to University Medical Center’s pediatrics unit, the arrest report said. The child was taken into emergency surgery with severe injuries, the report said.

The mother told police that she had been dating Alamilla-Perez for a year and that the couple had lived together for about seven months.

She told police he frequently watched her kids while she went to work. She also said her kids “loved” Alamilla-Perez and that she never saw him mistreat her children, according to the arrest report.

Alamilla-Perez told detectives that the toddler had had a dirty, leaky diaper at about 9:30 p.m. and told her 9-year-old brother to bathe her. He told police that the baby had fallen in the shower during the bath, but he didn’t hear or see the fall, according to the arrest report.

When asked who should be held accountable for the 2-year-old’s injuries, Alamilla-Perez said, “I don’t know,” according to the arrest report.

Detectives interviewed the 9-year-old boy, who told officers that Alamilla-Perez was angry about the dirty diaper and that he punched the child in the stomach, back and ribs, repeatedly, while the boy and two other siblings were downstairs watching TV. The boy also described hearing the child cry and witnessing Alamilla-Perez punch the baby while taking her upstairs to his mother’s bedroom. The boy also told police he heard the baby fall down from being hit so hard.

According to the arrest report, three other children were home during the incident but were sleeping. The 9-year-old also told police that Alamilla-Perez would frequently hit all of the children, except for his brother, according to the arrest report.

Alamilla-Perez was booked into Clark County Detention Center and faces three counts of child abuse and neglect with substantial bodily harm, one count of child abuse and one count of child neglect with substantial bodily harm.

At the time of his arrest, the 2-year-old was on life support at UMC.

Contact Jessica Terrones at jterrones@reviewjournal.com or at 702-383-0381. Follow @JessATerrones on Twitter.