Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Murder charge expected in girl’s death

Before she died Tuesday night from alleged abuse, 2-year-old Jada Southall had repeatedly been injured while her mother was at work.

Osvaldo Lopez, the boyfriend of the girl's mother and the babysitter for her two children, had explanations for every injury: She fell off a table, a box fell on her, her 1-year-old brother was always hitting her with toys.

On Monday, after Lopez called 911 because the little girl stopped breathing, he allegedly admitted to police that he had thrown her four feet because she wouldn't stop crying.

Jada died of her injuries, which were consistent with shaken baby syndrome, about 8:30 p.m. Tuesday, and Lopez is expected to be charged with murder, authorities said.

The toddler had been in and out of area hospitals for the past month for injuries including a broken collarbone, an arm injury and bruises, according to a Metro Police report.

Since her Monday night arrival at Sunrise Hospital, Jada had been in critical condition and on life support from head wounds, bruises and blood loss, Sunrise spokesman Rick Plummer said.

Doctors also discovered a rectal tear, the police report said, and Metro's sexual assault detectives are investigating whether she had been molested.

According to the police report, Lopez told detectives that Jada fell down a lot, had injured her arm about three weeks ago, was suffering from a cough and often cried for more than half an hour after her mother went to work at Target each day.

Three weeks ago 26-year-old Lopez, who was unemployed, called the mother at work and told her the child fell from a table onto a chair and broke her clavicle, according to the police report. The report also said that a week ago Lopez told the mother a box fell onto the girl's chest.

The child's mother, Roxie Southall, told police she "calls home every 30 minutes to ensure Lopez is not cheating," and Lopez had told her at about 7 p.m. Monday that the child had been fed and was sleeping, according to the police report.

Then, at 9:20 p.m., Lopez called Southall and told her Jada wasn't breathing, the police report notes.

A co-worker drove 19-year-old Southall home to her apartment in the Charleston Pines complex where Southall found her child lying motionless on the floor, the police report said.

At 9:40 p.m., Lopez called 911. Medical personnel responded to the 4800 block of East Charleston Boulevard near Nellis Boulevard and took the girl to Sunrise Hospital, where doctors determined she had sustained severe trauma just before being brought to the hospital, Lt. Brad Simpson of Metro's abuse and neglect detail said.

Lopez told detectives that he tried to feed Jada, then checked on her half an hour later when, he told detectives, she was lying face down on a couch in her bedroom with the arm sling around her neck.

When detectives asked why Jada had bruises on her face, lower back, legs and arms, Lopez allegedly told them, "because she is always falling and her brother hits her with toys."

Lopez continued to deny that he had hit or hurt her, but said he "did something, it must have been an accident," the report notes.

Then, Lopez admitted to another detective that he had thrown Jada about four feet onto the living room couch because she was crying after her mother left for work, according to the report.

Police, who are still investigating the death, initially arrested Lopez on two counts of child abuse with substantial bodily harm. The charges are to be upgraded to murder.

Lopez was scheduled to appear in Clark County Justice Court at 9 a.m. today.

Lopez had been arrested for violence in the past, according to Metro Police records.

Police arrested him for domestic battering four times between September 1999 and May 2001, and he was convicted of the charge once, Sgt. Chris Jones, police spokesman, said.

His criminal record also includes arrests for battery and automobile burglary in 2004; drug offenses, possession of a deadly weapon, traffic violations, possession of stolen property and resisting police in 2003; and possession of a controlled substance in 1999.

Jada's godfather cried quietly while waiting in the Children's Hospital Tuesday night.

Ted Dunn, a 28-year Las Vegas resident, was surrounded by friends of Jada's mother, as they prayed, ate pizza and drank soda.

Dunn said he watched Jada being born and became her godfather.

"She's going to be missed," Dunn said, wiping tears from his cheeks. "Our little angel is now an angel."

A Western Cab driver for 21 years, Dunn said that he had met Southall's boyfriend a couple of times.

"Roxie told us he was abusive toward her, but she was too scared to report it," Dunn said.

Dunn said a family member had called him at 2 a.m. Tuesday and he came right to the hospital. "I've been here ever since," he said.

"The doctors told us she has severe head trauma, that she's bleeding internally and has tears in her rectum," Dunn said.

"You've got to be warped or sick to do something like that," the godfather said.

Southall had worked at the Target store on East Charleston and Nellis boulevards about seven months while Lopez watched the children, Dunn said.

"Jada was the apple of everybody's eye," Dunn said. "She'd go, 'Love, love, kiss, kiss.' "

Although Jada was tiny she knew her ABCs already and she could count to 10, Dunn said.

When Dunn was with Jada and they heard the sound of the ice cream truck "she'd run to the door and shout, 'ice cream, ice cream,' " he said.

Southall is about three months pregnant with Lopez's baby, Dunn said. "She's going to have a hard time. She can barely stand it."

Neighbors at the apartment complex, spoken to prior to Jada's passing, were saddened to hear about the injuries to the cheerful little girl who they said often wandered around outside unsupervised.

"The little girl was a happy-go-lucky little child," a 14-month resident of the complex said. She declined to give her name. "I cried when I heard about what had happened."

Southall's son was taken from the home and placed at Child Haven, Simpson said. Lopez is also accused of abusing him, but that child did not require medical care Monday night. The police report said that the child was checked at Sunrise because his hands appeared swollen and he had bruises on his inner legs, small bruises on his face and some on his arms.

Simpson said police have had no prior abuse allegations on record in connection regarding Jada or her brother.

Tuesday night, when Susan Klein Rothschild, the director of Clark County Family Services and the person in charge of Clark County Child Protective Services, was asked whether Jada slipped through a crack in the system, she said: "I don't know that, but I do know the process will help identify that if it happened."

Another neighbor, who refused to give her name, said that recently Jada was toddling around the complex in just her underpants, asking neighbors, "Where's my mama?"

"She went all the way from one end of the complex to the other," the neighbor said, shaking her head.

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