By Kathy Chaffin
kchaffin@salisburypost.com
Barring any new evidence, the Rowan County District Attorney’s Office will not pursue criminal charges in the May 2, 2008, death of a 10-month-old Salisbury infant.
District Attorney Bill Kenerly said he talked to a doctor with the N.C. Medical Examiner’s Office in Charlotte about the autopsy report on Emmanuel Campusano Jr. of 923 S. Caldwell St. “The medical examiner could not give a cause of death that would indicate homicidal conduct,” Kenerly said.
Kenerly said some information pointed to living circumstances for the infant being “sub-par, but that doesn’t help us prove a homicide.”
The boy lived with his parents, Emmanuel Campusano Sr. and Tana Maria Mings, and his then-19-month-old sister, according to the initial police report. The baby was transported by ambulance to Rowan Regional Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 12:37 p.m.
CPR was administered on the baby en route to the emergency room and for 15 minutes after arrival.
Emmanuel Campusano Sr. told police his son was fine when he left him with his mother about two hours earlier to go shopping. He reported getting a call at 12:28 p.m. telling him that EMS had been called.
The baby had been generally healthy, his father told police, though he had been born six weeks premature and suffered with fluid on his lungs.
A state child fatality review was held on the case Dec. 11-12.
Tom Brewer, program administrator for the Rowan County Department of Social Services’ children’s services division, said at a March 3 meeting of the Community Child Protection Team that the findings of the review would not be released until the Salisbury Police Department completed its investigation.
Director Sandra Wilkes said the report will be made public at an upcoming Community Child Protection Team meeting, either the next scheduled one in June or a called meeting just for the purpose of hearing the report.
She said she will wait to hear from Jeff Olsen, who supervises the state child fatality reviewers, on when the report will be released.
Legislation passed during Gov. Jim Martin’s term mandated an on-site state child fatality review when the deceased child and its family had received child protective services from the local Social Services department within 12 months of the death.
Brewer said the department is proceeding with a response plan to the findings of the report, including educating the public on the dangers of co-sleeping with infants.
Board Chairman Nilous Avery said this will be one of the areas addressed at the second annual Child Well-Being Roundtable in May.
Contact Kathy Chaffin at 704-797-4249.