A 29-year-old Wichita Falls man is charged with injury to a child, after police allege he kicked a 4-year-old boy he thought threw a bottle at him.
When police went to the hospital they say the child’s mother told them her son suffered internal injuries after his father, Derek Lynn Mauldin, accidently kicked him.
Police say Mauldin told them the boy threw a bottle, hitting him in the eye and it caused him to have a reflex kick which he said was not hard.
But a doctor said the injury was not consistent with that type of kick.
She said the boy had a perforated organ from blunt force trauma that forced liquid into his stomach.
The child was taken to Cook Children’s Hospital in Fort Worth for emergency surgery.
Doctors there say the injury was similar to those in high speed traffic accidents and listed it as physical abuse.
Interviews with a 6-year-old also in the house revealed that he actually threw the bottle.
The boy says Mauldin didn’t see him throw it, and thought the 4-year-old lying on the floor threw it.
The 6-year-old demonstrated how he said Mauldin kicked the child, by lifting his knee and stomping down on the child’s stomach.
(Information from TexomasHomepage.com)
