The catastrophic head injury 23-month-old Lincoln Davitte suffered had to be a freak accident, as defense experts testified Thursday, May 12. There was no way Charles Michael Sconyers would have hurt Lincoln, he and several of the people who know him well told the jury.
It will be up to a Columbia County Superior Court jury to decide if Sconyers, 31, was falsely accused, or guilty of murder or some lesser crime.
Thursday, Sconyerrs told the jury that he considered his girlfriend’s toddler his own child in the months leading up to Lincoln’s death on May 4, 2019.
“I would never hurt him or any child,” Sconyers said between sobs Thursday.
Every day, every night he thinks of Lincoln’s last conscious moments, he said.
“I did everything I could possibly do to help him,” he said.
When asked by his attorney if his testimony was the truth, Sconyers replied, “I swear to God.”
On May 1, 2019, Sconyers picked Lincoln up from his daycare. A video of him carrying out a crying Lincoln was played for the jury this week. Less than 20 minutes later, Sconyers was calling 911. He said he found Lincoln unconscious, that Lincoln must have fallen and hit his head. He found Lincoln face down on the cement patio in the backyard.
Lincoln suffered a skull fracture that stretched from the top of his head to the base and around both sides of his head, witnesses testified this week. There was no recovery from the massive brain damage it caused.
Sconyers was a sergeant in the Augusta Fire Department when he and Chelsea Finch began a relationship. Near the end of 2018 he moved in with her, Lincoln and Lincoln’s older sister, and Lincoln’s crib was moved into his sister’s room.
Sconyers’ coworkers and friends, his soon-to-be mother-in-law, who was also Lincoln’s grandmother, and Sconyer’s ex-wife told the jury that Sconyers is a good man, easy-going, eager to help others and good with children.
Capt. Richard Johnson Jr. and Lt. Brian Cameron of the Augusta Fire Department both said they wouldn’t hesitate to trust Sconyer’s with their own children. The murder and child abuse charges he faces didn’t change their opinion on that, they told the jury.
Dr. Joseph Scheller, a pediatric neurologist who testified on behalf of defendants in 275 cases, said Thursday he was positive Lincoln’s fatal injury was caused by the toddler falling and hitting his head, compounding the damage a prior trauma had caused but was unknown at the time. It couldn’t have been abuse, not by a man dedicated to saving others, Scheller testified. He also testified it was very common for 2-year-olds to sleepwalk.
Sconyers and Lincoln’s mother told a social worker with the Department of Family and Children’s Services that Lincoln had fallen on the hard surface of his bed frame while sleepwalking and blackened both eyes in March 2019. Another black eye happened when he knocked over his highchair at his grandmother’s house either in March or on April 29, 2019, according to different witnesses.
Sconyers testified that Lincoln immediately became attached to him, and he tried to be the father Lincoln hadn’t had in life before.
Under cross-examination Sconyers said Lincoln’s mother took him to the doctor because of the sleepwalking and that she took Lincoln to the doctor because Lincoln was jealous was jealous of him. She wanted to learn from the doctor how to discipline Lincoln for “acting out” without making the situation worse, Sconyers testified. He had only disciplined Lincoln once physically, and then only by a small pop on his behind, he said.
A second defense expert, Dr. James Downs a former medical examiner with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, told the jury that no “respectable” doctor would opine Lincoln’s injury resulted from child abuse only based on the medical evidence. He would have listed the cause of Lincoln’s death as undetermined, Down testified.
The GBI medical examiner who performed the autopsy on Lincoln’s body, Dr. Lora Darrisaw, testified the cause of death was homicide. Lincoln’s skull fracture wasn’t the result of him falling from a standing or running position, she said. The massive damage was caused by tremendous force and probably from multiple impacts, Darrisaw testified.
After listening to closing arguments and the judge’s instructions on the laws that apply in the case, the jury will begin deliberations Friday.
