Erwin Joel Ocasio

 

 

 

 

 

Erwin's 15 year old stepsister saw a car seat inside a bedroom, at first she only saw a red sweat shirt. When she looked closer, she discovered the sweat shirt contained her two year old brother. He was badly beaten, bound and gagged. Erwin was alone in the room, with his sweat shirt put on backward with the hood and the drawstrings pulled as tight as possible to cover his face. When his sister looked underneath the sweat shirt, she saw the bruises on his face, but she knew Erwin was alive because his leg moved. She did not immediately report what she saw because she feared punishment from her parents.

 

Weeks later, Erwin’s father said he hit Erwin on the chest and back in an attempt to revive him when he had passed out after vomiting. Then, Ocasio said, he also accidentally hit Erwin's head on a door frame and again on the bathroom floor.

On September 23, 2003 Ocasio carried his badly bruised son, Erwin Ocasio, into the Connecticut Children's Medical Center in Hartford. Erwin was in cardiac arrest when he arrived. He was being treated for multiple injuries and was placed on life support.  On September 26, 2003, at 9:45 a.m., Erwin Ocasio was removed from life support and pronounced dead.  Three days later on September 27, 2003, the State Chief Medical Examiner's Office determined the cause of death as Blunt Traumatic Head Injury.

 

Cruz, who has two daughters by Ocasio, beat the boy with a stick to get him to eat and encouraged her daughters to hit him. Cruz,was convicted of risk of injury to a minor and hindering prosecution. Cruz had faced a capital felony charge, which carries a potential death sentence. She agreed to serve up to five years in prison as part of a plea deal in which she avoids a capital felony charge. Ocasio was sentenced to 20 years in prison. The actual term handed down for first-degree manslaughter was 20 years and a consecutive 10 years, which was suspended, and five years probation for two counts of risk of injury to a child. Ocasio had faced charges of capital felony and murder, and thus a possible death sentence, but he agreed to plead guilty to the lesser charges in exchange for no more than 30 years in prison.