Infant girl’s killer gets life in prison

Before his sentencing Thursday, convicted infant-killer Theodore Stevens expounded upon his belief in God as his one true judge.

"Sentence me to whatever you want to. Sentence me. That's your guys' word. It's not God's word," Stevens, 31, told District Judge Donald Mosley.

Mosley asked him, "Do you think the Lord sanctions killing babies?"

Stevens replied that God sent King David to kill millions of people.

Stevens represented himself during his trial and was convicted in July of first-degree murder by child abuse for the March 2005 death of his girlfriend's 5-month-old daughter.

Mosley sentenced Stevens to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

That was sentence recommended by prosecutors, who during the trial, played for jurors Stevens' taped confession to police in which he took responsibility for the baby's death.

Stevens told police he and his girlfriend, Duchess Davis, were staying with her infant, Russia Cheesecake Davis, at Buffalo Bill's in Primm, and Stevens got up in the middle of the night and picked up Russia while Davis slept.

Stevens said he dropped Russia, and when she wouldn't stop crying he punched her in the back of the head a couple of times.

Stevens tried to convince the jury that he falsely confessed because he was being threatened by police. He told the jury that what actually happened was the baby had fallen off the bed.

At one point in his defense, he insinuated that Russia's mother also was responsible for the death. He pointed out that she did not testify during the trial.

Prosecutors told the jurors that she didn't testify because they had been unable to locate her.

Davis pleaded guilty to being an after-the-fact accessory in her daughter's death and received probation.

On the morning she discovered her daughter was not moving and apparently not breathing, she had called her father in a panic. Her father told her to call 911, and she told him Stevens would not let her.

"Not only did he beat this child to death, when the mother tried to call 911, he wouldn't let her," prosecutor Brian Rutledge said.

At the time, Stevens was on parole in California and was not supposed to be out of that state, according to court documents.

Stevens had four prior convictions, including one in 1998 for child neglect in Broward County, Fla.

Rutledge said in that case Stevens had gotten into an argument with a girlfriend in Florida and broke the arm of her son. Stevens tried to prevent the boy from receiving medical attention, but the child's mother called police, Rutledge said.

Stevens, who has filed an appeal on the case, told Mosley that prosecutors obtained an "oily, oily" and "slimy" conviction, because they did not call key witnesses, including Davis, to testify.

"It's going to be overturned," Stevens told Mosley.