A Texas judge sentenced a man to life in prison after he was convicted in the 2019 murder of a 2-year-old girl who was beaten to death because she put her shoes on the wrong feet.
Following a three-day trial, a jury in Bell County found 27-year-old Jadin Nunez guilty of capital murder of a child under the age of ten in the 2019 death of his girlfriend’s daughter, Shannah McAlpine.
Ashley Marie McAlpine, of Temple, the toddler’s mother, has been charged with felony first-degree injury to a child with the intent to cause serious bodily injury. She has entered a not guilty plea.
Officers from the Temple Police Department and EMTs were dispatched to a home in the 800 block of South 11th Street at approximately 2:50 a.m. on Sept. 22, 2019, after receiving a call about an unresponsive child, according to the report. When first responders arrived on the scene, they discovered Shannah was not breathing. According to reports, the child was “covered in bruises.”
Prosecutors claim that when officers arrived at Nunez and her mother, Ashley Marie McAlpine’s home in September 2019, they discovered the young girl unresponsive and bruised.
Nunez began beating Shannah when she put her shoes on the wrong feet as they prepared to go to a store to get supplies for her birthday party, according to authorities.
He punched the girl in the face three times before holding her in the air and punching her in the stomach three times. Shannah’s mother told investigators that she called 911 after discovering her daughter’s stomach “swollen and hot” several hours later.
McAlpine stated that she attempted to cool the girl down by putting her in the shower, but she was unable to stand on her own and was having difficulty breathing.
According to her autopsy, the little girl died as a result of blunt force trauma to her stomach.
Nunez was apprehended two days after the death of the little girl. McAlpine was charged with injury to a child in December of last year after authorities claimed she failed to stop Nunez from abusing her child.
Ashley McAlpine is currently being held on a $500,000 bond in Bell County Jail. On Oct. 29, she is due in court for a pre-trial hearing.
