A murder charge was filed Friday against a man accused of beating his ex-girlfriend’s 5-year-old son to death and leaving the body inside a dumpster in Panorama City last week, authorities said.
Brycson Gaddis, 20, was arrested Wednesday and, if convicted, faces a potential sentence of life in prison in the vicious beating death of Elyjiah Hearn, according to the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office. Prosecutors charged him with murder and assault on a child causing death, authorities said.
“This is truly a heartbreaking and horrific case, and our deepest sympathies go out to the young victim’s family,” Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman said in a statement. “We are committed to seeking justice and will ensure this defendant is held responsible for his actions.”
Gaddis did not enter a plea during a brief court appearance in Van Nuys and is due back in court next month, officials said.
Prosecutors allege Gaddis beat the boy to death inside of an apartment in the 14500 block of Lanark Street on July 11. The boy’s body was found the next day in what prosecutors described as a “commercial parking lot dumpster.”
A law enforcement official previously told The Times the boy suffered “massive injuries,” including a broken jaw, fractured ribs and a lacerated liver. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
Gaddis and the boy’s mother, Kemia Hearn, had dated on and off in the past but Gaddis was not the boy’s father. The victim’s grandfather, Troy Hearn Sr., said Gaddis had been stalking his daughter.
“It’s very heartbreaking for him to do that to my 5-year-old grandson,” Hearn Sr. said earlier this week. “I’m identifying the body this afternoon. I’m overwhelmed and so angry that I can’t even explain it. This guy is a bad guy and it’s lucky that the police has him.”
Gaddis was in police custody more than once over the past year, but he twice avoided jury trials that could have sent him to jail or prison. A warrant for his arrest had been issued three months before the slaying, records show.
Last July, prosecutors charged Gaddis and two others with carjacking and beating someone with a “metal bar” in Baldwin Park. But the case was dismissed in mid-December when a prosecutor announced he was “unable to proceed” on the day of Gaddis’ preliminary hearing, according to court records.
Court records offer no additional details about why the prosecutor could not proceed. Gaddis had been in jail for six months at the time, but was ordered released soon after. A spokesman for the district attorney’s office did not provide an explanation.
Six weeks later, Gaddis was arrested by Los Angeles police for repeatedly punching his girlfriend in a Hollywood apartment complex. The victim in that case was not Elyjiah’s mother, records show.
Gaddis was charged with domestic violence and false imprisonment, but allowed to remain free while wearing an electronic monitoring device. In April, Gaddis failed to appear in court for his scheduled trial and a judge issued a bench warrant for his arrest.
A month later, his electronic monitoring device ran out of power and he ignored check-in calls from the company that issued the device, records show. An alert was sent to the L.A. County Probation Department.
The Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office referred questions to the Los Angeles Police Department, which did not respond to a question about what, if any, measures they took to re-capture Gaddis after he ducked his trial date. But given Gaddis had no criminal record after the carjacking case was dismissed, it’s unlikely police would have prioritized arresting a defendant who was wanted on a misdemeanor bench warrant.
Vicky Waters, a probation department spokeswoman, said Gaddis was “not under active supervision” by the agency because his case had not been adjudicated yet.
“Probation does not have an enforcement role in these circumstances,” Waters said.
Staff writer Summer Lin contributed to this report.
