Trinity Poague is accused of beating her boyfriend’s 18-month-old son to death in her college dorm room (Picture: Sumter County Sheriff’s Office)
A former beauty pageant queen is accused of beating her boyfriend’s 18-month-old son to death in her college dorm room while her partner went to pick up pizza.
Trinity Poague, 20, has pleaded not guilty to charges of malice murder, first-degree cruelty to children, felony murder, and aggravated battery.
Prosecutors claimed that Poague resented the child because she wanted one of her own with her boyfriend, Julian Williams.
They also alleged that she sent texts to her roommate, saying she wanted to punch the child.
On 14 January, 2024, Little Romeo ‘Jaxton’ Angeles was found unresponsive with fatal blunt force trauma wounds at Georgia Southwestern State University.
The former Miss Donalsonville claims the toddler fell off the bed, but police say she caused ‘serious disfigurement to his liver’ and ‘rendered his brain useless’, according to an indictment obtained by Court TV.
District Attorney Lewis R. ‘Bud’ Lamb said that Poague and her boyfriend had gone out to dinner with the child the night before his death.
She allegedly texted the child ‘hates me and I hate him’ to her roommate, Paris.
Trinity Poague is currently on trial for the murder of Baby Romeo ‘Jaxton’ Angeles(Picture: CourtTV)
Poague later asked her roommate to sleep in her room as the child was allegedly being fussy, and her boyfriend was no help.
At the same time, she said the child ‘rolled off the bed’, videos from her phone showed Jaxton acting normally with no bruises, the court heard.
Lilly Waterman, a student at the university, told WRDW that, at the time, she heard the toddler crying for a long time and that ‘everyone said that suddenly it just stopped.’
The next day, around noon, her boyfriend left to pick up pizza.
Poague allegedly called him while he was out, saying the child was ‘not breathing’ and that she did not know what happened.
Williams rushed his child to the hospital and, at around 4pm, the toddler died.
Lamb said that the night before, ‘he didn’t have a mark on him’, ‘didn’t have any injury and he wasn’t in distress.
‘But by the time the child got to the emergency room after spending 35 minutes in that room with Trinity Poague, he had fresh bruising on his face.’
Little Jaxton had several injuries, including brain bleeds, bruises and a laceration on his liver(Picture: Handout)
Little Jaxton was also experiencing brain bleeds, a laceration on his liver, and several bruises all over his face and neck.
Lamb said he also had a bone fracture at the back of his head that haemorrhaged.
He continued: ‘It’s an acute injury. It’s not an injury that happened the night before.
‘It’s not an injury that could have happened, realistically, from a child falling off the bed, falling out of a chair, or anything else.
‘It’s an injury that could have literally only occurred within a few minutes before this child was presented at the emergency room.’
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WT ‘Tim’ Gamble III, Poague’s attorney, said Williams was a ‘controlling boyfriend’ who had been drinking the night before the incident.
Poague’s title of Miss Donalsonville was reportedly stripped from her after her arrest (Picture: Instagram/trinpoague)
Although Gamble acknowledged the texts between Poague and her roommate, he said that the investigators have ‘no evidence’ she committed the crime.
According to Early County News, Poague had her title of Miss Donalsonville stripped following her arrest.
A GoFundMe to help Jaxton’s father was set up and has raised more than $12,000.
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