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Local Man Gets 25 Years For Killing Infant

BENTONVILLE (KFSM) — A Bethel Heights man was sentenced Thursday (Dec. 21) to 25 years in prison for killing a 3-month-old boy last summer. Edward Alexis ...
edward alexis martinez-torres

BENTONVILLE (KFSM) — A Bethel Heights man was sentenced Thursday (Dec. 21) to 25 years in prison for killing a 3-month-old boy last summer.

Edward Alexis Martinez-Torres, 21, agreed to plead guilty to first-degree murder. Martinez-Torres was initially charged with capital murder.

After he’s released from the state Department of Correction, Martinez-Torres must abide by a 15-year suspended sentence.

The Benton County Sheriff’s Office responded June 9, 2016, to a 911 call for a baby that wasn’t breathing.

The boy was taken to Northwest Medical Center and later transferred to Arkansas Children’s Hospital in Little Rock, where it was discovered the child had suffered a skull fracture, according to the sheriff’s office.

During initial interviews with investigators, Martinez-Torres said he had laid down to take a nap with the child and his hand accidentally fell on the child’s head while he was asleep, the release states.

The child passed away June 15 and an autopsy revealed the baby had suffered a skull fracture caused by non-impact “compressive force,” according to the release. Martinez-Torres was arrested the next day.

When investigators confronted Martinez-Torres with the information, he said he had been babysitting the child, who was crying and would not stop, when he became frustrated and slapped the baby with an open hand, then grabbed the child by the forehead while pushing him downward into the mattress.

The baby stopped crying and Martinez-Torres put the child in a bassinet until his mother — Martinez-Torres’ girlfriend — arrived 20 minutes later and found the baby was not breathing, according to the release.

Martinez-Torres is not the boy’s father.

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