Baby Allyssa Dies

Allyssa Nunez

Tonight, we have full coverage of the events leading to the death of a little girl from Maskall, who has rallied the nation against the despicable sexual abuse of children. And the latest word to our newsroom just before five this evening is that a post mortem has concluded. The results show that she died from massive brain hemorrhaging consistent with injuries from a blunt instrument. That’s the cause of death, but the results also confirm signs of sexual abuse, though not as recent.  Now, Allyssa bravely fought for her life for four days; sometime last Wednesday morning, while in the care of her stepfather, she was injured on the head.  But even more horrific, the child was sexually abused.  Her stepfather Everal Martinez has been charged and we’ll come to that later. Denika Flowers, the toddler’s mother, has remained quiet as she grieves the death of her young daughter. But the child’s biological father, Terrence Nunez, has painfully spoken out about the roller coaster of events between Wednesday and Sunday morning when baby Allyssa lost her battle. News Five’s Isani Cayetano has the following story.

Isani Cayetano, Reporting

In spite of the best effort by medical personnel at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital to keep her alive, seventeen-month-old Allyssa Nunez lost the fight to survive a most macabre ordeal.  The toddler is perhaps the youngest victim of a sexual offence in local records, an unfathomable act of cruelty reportedly committed by her stepfather.

Voice of: Terrence Nunez, Father of Deceased

“All these different scenarios or evidence they have found on the baby detecting that she had a gash to the head, probably, more than likely.  It is still unconfirmed as to what happened, why she had bleeding in the head, okay.  But what they can confirm on such note [is that] she was abused.  She was sexually abused also, everybody knows that.”

Terrence Nunez

Allyssa’s biological parents are separated and her mother subsequently got involved with twenty-one-year-old Everal Martinez.  Little did Denika Flowers know that her daughter would suffer such a heartless end.  Terrence Nunez, the father by birth, recounts opening an electronic message informing him of what had taken place.

Terrence Nunez

“It stated that your baby is at the hospital, you gotta go and check that out.  So I went and I called the mother on Whatsapp and the same young man answered and I asked questions and then I came to the hospital and then I spoke to them and everything and then as time progressed we spoke to the, the doctor came because they were only allowing either the mom or the dad, but then it came to a point whereby it was very severe that the baby had many seizures before she came over to the K.H.M.H.”

Those bouts of convulsions were presumably the result of the baby having endured a massive blow to the head.  Just before dawn on Sunday, doctors pronounced her dead.  That statement, regrettably, came after word of her demise had initially been passed on to the family several hours earlier.

Jose Luis Espat

Jose Luis Espat, Social Activist

“I don’t have any evidence or don’t believe that the hospital had anything to do directly with the death of the child.  I believe that in this case the hospital did what they had to do; however, I do have several problems with the way they handled this situation and it would make any person that thinks, including the family, question their actions.  Up to this second that we’re talking, there has been no medical practitioner, no specialist that has come out to speak to the family and inform them of what the baby’s medical conditions were from the time that they brought the baby.  What conditions the baby came to the hospital with and what transpired between the time that the baby arrived at the hospital to the time that the baby passed away.  A lot of things that happened and coincidences are, it’s just questionable.  For example, they always keep telling them that the baby has passed, the baby hasn’t passed and again the baby has passed.  So for someone going through an emotional distress of this sort it’s something horrible.”

The false report in the first instance created a bit of chaos among the grieving families on Saturday night, prompting hospital authorities to call the police department.

Jose Luis Espat

“One incident that angered me is that it was their fault.  They told the family members and the parents that the child was dead.  When the parents started grieving and crying loud in the NICU.  They went and cleared it, I was there myself, I was inside the NICU and witnessed everything.  I can tell you that there were cameras there.  They did not act in any unruly manner or in any way that would cause any concern to the hospital staff.  So they asked them to leave and when they were coming out of course the family was hurting, all the family was out here crying and of course they were upset.  Out here they started to make noise so the security didn’t even come and ask them to leave.  They called the police and the police came three vehicles, three police vehicles.  Now I must call a spade a spade, we were lucky to have police men and women that came with understanding and they did not come to assault anybody.  They did not come here on the intentions of hurting anyone.”

The emotional trauma of what has transpired weighs heavily on the grieving first-time father.

Voice of: Terrence Nunez

“It’s so like painful fu hear my baby in that state, I mean she never really deserved that.  I try my best fu raise my baby to the fullest fu mek someone who noh even, someone weh noh even deh eena my position right now, or noh even put towards fu raise my kid, fi do something so brutal and so severe. It’s my first baby and she only see her life only at one year, five months.  It’s so devastating, she didn’t start her life as yet, you know.  So it’s very hurt.”

Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.