By Andy Furillo
afurillo@sacbee.com
Closing arguments began today in Sacramento Superior Court in the second-degree murder trial of a man accused of shaking his 6-month-old baby to death two years ago.
Deputy District Attorney Rochelle Hao told jurors that Kevin Harper, who worked the graveyard shift as a stocker at a Wal-Mart store, grew frustrated when his son, Jaden, woke him as he tried to sleep during the day. The prosecutor said the 26-year-old defendant lost control just long enough to kill his child.
"He was a healthy, thriving baby boy until Aug. 21, 2008, when something horrible happened," Hao said. "He was left with someone who was supposed to care for him. He was left with someone he should have been able to trust. He was left with his father, Kevin Harper, who murdered him."
Assistant Public Defender Sue Karlton argued that the baby, who was born prematurely, had a bleeding disorder almost from the time he entered the world, and that he had been taken to the emergency room twice in the months before he died because blood was found in his stool and in his vomit. There had never been any indication in the boy's prior hospital visits that he had been subject to child abuse, Karlton said.
"The proof here is that this child was bleeding and had been bleeding throughout his entire short life," Karlton told the jury.
An autopsy showed that Jaden Harper died of blunt head and neck trauma due to "shaken impact," Hao told the jury. Karlton disputed the coroner's findings, saying that "these dinky little bruises" found on the boy's body were not consistent with anybody shaking him or slamming him against a hard surface.
Hao is scheduled to give her rebuttal argument early this afternoon, before Judge Michael W. Sweet instructs the jury and sends jurors to deliberate.
Call The Bee's Andy Furillo, (916) 321-1141.
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