Child died

A friend of mine’s granddaughter, age four, was killed by a 16 year old man. He didn’t admit to it, but he was the only one present and he surrendered immediately once the police arrived, having not alerted them himself. The child had been acting strangely for about 24 hours, possibly a brain injury; she was found lying face up, eyes open, lips blue, with this young man sitting calmly in the same room, not at all alarmed.

I thought to myself, congratulations on satisfying your curiosity, man: you now know what it feels like to kill someone. It will cost you the trust of everyone you will ever meet, including yourself. Even if he were acquitted, everyone who knows of this event will have an opinion of his character, and many will hate him.

He admitted to biting her, after she bit him. A four year old biting someone? Nearly an every day occurrence in daycares and homes across the country. But the adults don’t bite back. In most cases the children don’t even bite back; they loudly object, appeal to authority, scream, start hitting the offender, or run away.

Why would she bite him? Usually biting is a surefire way to get someone to stop what they’re doing, after indicating in other ways that what they’re doing hurts or annoys the biter. It’s the preschooler’s big guns: they can’t kick or hit with any real force, though they try. They writhe when held against their will, but the power is all on the adult’s side. Teeth are the small child’s only real weapon.

The cause of death was not immediately obvious; there was no massive lump on her head nor gaping wounds. An autopsy will show more. But it doesn’t matter; she’s dead and he’s heavily implicated. His life will turn almost as much as hers did, but in the opposite direction. She’s in heaven, with her great-grandparents and others who love her. She wasn’t old enough to have consciously sinned. Her Creator greeted her with arms full of love.