Teen Admits To Repeatedly Punching Young Sister's Face Before Her Death

A teenage boy from The Bronx, New York allegedly admitted to assaulting his 7-year-old sister over snacks before she was found dead in their apartment this week, police revealed a day after the girl's death.

Police officers and medical personnel were summoned to an apartment in the Mitchel Houses at around 8 a.m. Tuesday, where they found Julissia Batties unconscious and with a head injury, the New York Times reported.

The child was reportedly taken to Lincoln Medical Center, but she was pronounced dead shortly after 9 a.m.

Batties' 35-year-old mother, Navasia Jones, allegedly claimed her daughter had fallen and hit her head on a desk at around 5 a.m. before vomiting three hours later. The 7-year-old, however, had other unexplained bruises on her body, according to police.

The child's 17-year-old half-brother, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, admitted to beating Batties because he believed she took some snacks, a high-ranking police official said Wednesday.

The teenager had punched his younger sister eight times in the face at around 5 p.m. while their mother was away, police sources said, as per the New York Post.

The older brother was reportedly taken to a facility run by the Administration for Children's Services (ACS) — the same agency that decided to permanently return Batties to her mother from her paternal grandmother, Yolanda Davis, according to the New York Times.

"I begged them not to let her go back to her mother, and now we’re here," Davis was quoted as saying. The elderly woman had allegedly raised Batties for most her life until April 2020, when the child was turned over to her mother.

Jones reportedly lost custody of Batties shortly after she was born in 2014. The ACS argued in an appeal that the child's safety was endangered by the failure of her parents to exercise a "minimum degree of care.”

The decision to return Batties to her mother was made by the ACS at the recommendation of a foster-care nonprofit called SCO Family Services, one of Davis' lawyers claimed. The organization managed Batties' case for the child welfare agency and had placed her with her grandmother, the lawyer noted.

"I’m very numb. I’m very hurt... I need justice to be done," Davis said.

Batties' family has a long history of involvement with child welfare authorities, records showed. Additionally, police have also allegedly visited the family's apartment several times prior to Batties' death.

Police have been called to the apartment six times over the past three years, the New York Post has learned. Jones covered for Batties' older brother on at least one of those occasions, sources claimed.

"There was always a commotion, always yelling, always screaming," neighbor Michael Roberts said.

Roberts added that his girlfriend called authorities last Friday after seeing Batties with a black eye.

Authorities, however, were only notified of the black eye incident Tuesday as it had been reported directly to the ACS and not through 911, a police official said.

"Those kids shouldn’t have been living in that house," an officer was quoted as saying in the New York Post report.

Investigators are waiting for a medical examiner to determine the official cause of Batties' death.

No charges have been filed over the girl's death.