Roselani Gaoa was accused of kid abuse 3 times whereas pregnant along with her youngest son, Baki Dewees.
The boy was born on April 14. Lower than three weeks later, he was lacking and presumed useless.
An investigation into the newborn’s disappearance led L.A. County sheriff’s officers to go looking an Antelope Valley landfill final month. His father, Yusef Ibn Dewees, was charged Wednesday with homicide and little one abuse, based on court docket data. Gaoa is jailed in Utah on suspicion of aggravated little one abuse.
A Instances evaluation of court docket paperwork and confidential police data reveals a historical past of abuse allegations within the six months earlier than Baki’s start and presumed demise, elevating questions on whether or not little one welfare officers missed possibilities to intervene and save the boy’s life.
The pinnacle of the Weber County public defender’s workplace in Utah, which is at the moment representing Gaoa and Dewees, declined to remark.
L.A. County prosecutors at the moment are looking for to extradite Dewees, however it’s not clear when he’ll subsequent seem in court docket.
Authorities in Utah say Gaoa was caught on video pummeling her 5-year-old daughter inside a homeless shelter only a day previous to Baki’s start. Gaoa had left California weeks earlier, not lengthy after discovering out she was going through little one abuse expenses in Los Angeles after she “misplaced management” whereas disciplining her 1-year-old son, based on data reviewed by The Instances.
Between November 2023 and April 2024, allegations surfaced that Gaoa, a mom of 4, had battered her 1-year-old son, ripped and minimize one other little one’s hair in Los Angeles, and beat and tried to smother her 5-year-old daughter, based on police and little one abuse studies obtained by The Instances and a public legal grievance filed in Utah.
The abuse allegations introduced panicked outcries from family and a legal submitting towards Gaoa, however little one welfare officers took virtually no motion towards the dad and mom within the six months main as much as Baki’s disappearance, the studies present. After every incident, the youngsters had been left within the custody of both Gaoa or Dewees, who was additionally accused of kid abuse final yr, based on the studies.
The Instances reviewed police studies and interviewed Baki’s grandmother and regulation enforcement officers about steps taken by little one welfare officers within the case.
The Los Angeles County Division of Kids and Household Companies and household welfare officers in Utah declined to reply questions for this text, citing privateness legal guidelines.
Baki’s presumed demise was the newest in a sequence of Antelope Valley-based tragedies the place L.A. County officers have been accused of failing to adequately reply to studies of kid abuse. Now, some within the child’s household are demanding solutions.
“They need to have executed one thing when all this was reported. I don’t know why they didn’t do something,” stated Baki’s grandmother, Fiti Paulo. “I’m actually offended with them.”
‘She refuses to hunt assist’
Gaoa, 25, was already struggling to deal with three children when she turned pregnant once more, based on Paulo.
She was “offended on a regular basis” and annoyed by her associate, Dewees, who routinely disappeared and was continuously drunk, hardly ever serving to with the youngsters, based on Paulo and a report made to L.A. County DCFS in November 2023.
Neither mother or father was working they usually had been dwelling in tight quarters with the youngsters’s great-grandparents in San Pedro, Paulo stated. The youngsters — ages 1, 3 and 5 — had been typically soiled and the oldest had by no means been to high school, Paulo stated.
“I imagine that she didn’t need to put them in class as a result of the children would possibly say one thing, like what could also be taking place within the residence, in the event that they’re being abused, issues like that,” the grandmother stated.
Paulo’s frustrations boiled over late final yr, when she known as DCFS and stated her daughter had “undiagnosed psychological well being points.”
“She refuses to hunt assist. Mom pulled the youngsters hair off their head and minimize their hair when she was upset,” learn the November 2023 Suspected Youngster Abuse Report, generally known as a SCAR, generated from Paulo’s name to DCFS. “Father drinks day by day, he turns into violent when he’s drunk.”
The report alleged that Dewees punched his oldest daughter within the face, and that two of the youngsters had been bruised. However Los Angeles cops noticed “no seen accidents” on the youngsters throughout a welfare verify, based on an LAPD report reviewed by The Instances. The officers solely interviewed Gaoa, who blamed the allegations on a tumultuous relationship along with her mom. They didn’t converse to Dewees or Paulo, based on the report.
An LAPD spokeswoman declined to touch upon the case.
One month later, a physician at UCLA Harbor Medical Heart observed bruises on the “thighs, left ear and buttocks” of Gaoa’s 1-year-old son, based on a police report. LAPD officers and a DCFS worker named Sarah Campos went to the hospital, the LAPD report stated, and Gaoa admitted she “misplaced management” whereas disciplining her 1-year-old.
She acknowledged experiencing frustration with elevating three kids whereas pregnant with a fourth and requested for assets to assist cope, the report stated.
‘Extraordinarily weird and unsettling’
Regardless of the second little one abuse allegation towards Gaoa in a one-month span, Campos “didn’t categorical any concern relating to elimination of the kid from the Suspect,” the LAPD report stated.
Campos didn’t return a name looking for remark.
“Each time I known as it looks as if they’re not very strict,” Paulo stated. “How is that not regarding?”
Sarah Font, a former little one abuse investigator who’s now a public coverage professor at Penn State College, stated the usage of bodily self-discipline towards a baby that younger ought to have set off alarm bells to any investigator. Kids haven’t any capability to be taught from corporal punishment at that age, Font stated, calling the response from L.A. County authorities “principally simply [a] shrug.”
“I discover that extraordinarily weird and unsettling,” Font stated, including that Gaoa’s use of bodily self-discipline “speaks to the concept the mom is clearly unable to handle her frustrations.”
Font stated there isn’t a uniform normal on when to take away a baby from a mother or father’s custody, however she believed Campos’ investigation was not thorough.
“In a case the place you could have clear bodily damage to a younger little one, you need to see DCFS take steps to reduce danger,” Font stated.
Not expressing concern, because the LAPD report described, “is simply not doing all your job,” she stated.
In January, the Los Angeles metropolis legal professional’s workplace filed one depend of misdemeanor little one abuse towards Gaoa. However on the day of her arraignment in March, Gaoa known as the court docket and stated she had moved to Utah. A decide rescheduled her listening to for April 5 and issued a bench warrant for her arrest after she failed to look in court docket for the second time.
A metropolis legal professional’s workplace spokesman declined to touch upon what, if any, communications metropolis prosecutors had with DCFS.
By the point the L.A. warrant for Gaoa was issued, the household was in Ogden, Utah, roughly 40 miles outdoors of Salt Lake Metropolis.
A 3rd abuse allegation
Eight days after the warrant for Gaoa’s arrest, she was caught on video repeatedly punching her 5-year-old daughter within the face and hanging her with a hairbrush inside a Utah homeless shelter, based on a legal grievance.
After screaming at her daughter to “shut the f— up and go to mattress,” Gaoa coated the kid’s face with a blanket earlier than “urgent down close to what seemed to be the place the 5-year-old’s face could be,” based on the grievance.
Gaoa gave start to Baki the following day, and 48 hours later, she was arrested on little one abuse expenses, Utah officers stated. She informed a police officer she “knew that she had hit her daughter however didn’t imply to hit her that many instances,” based on the legal grievance.
Native authorities didn’t know concerning the prior little one abuse allegations towards Gaoa, based on Weber County Dist. Atty. Christopher Allred, who stated the knowledge didn’t seem in searches of a nationwide legal database. It’s not clear whether or not the Utah Division of Youngster and Household Companies knew of the previous allegations.
The Utah company launched all 4 of Gaoa’s kids into Dewees’ custody on April 17, based on their grandmother and a regulation enforcement official concerned within the case who spoke on the situation of anonymity with a purpose to focus on an ongoing investigation.
Font, the previous investigator, stated it’s usually troublesome for a kid welfare company in a single state to get data of abuse in one other, which means it’s unlikely Utah officers knew of the California allegations. Font stated the truth that Dewees was homeless whereas caring for 4 children wouldn’t have been sufficient to revoke custody.
Dewees and the youngsters moved in with Paulo in Palmdale, the grandmother stated.
Paulo stated she final noticed Baki on Could 3. That morning, Dewees left the house with the new child and his 3-year-old daughter, she stated. Paulo reported the boy lacking on Could 7, the identical day Dewees returned to the homeless shelter in Ogden. There, he was requested by police concerning the child’s whereabouts, based on a legal grievance filed in Utah.
Baki Dewees in an undated picture offered by a member of the family.
(Courtesy of Fiti Paolo)
He claimed the boy was in Florida along with his paternal grandparents, adopted by a California girl after which alternatively deserted at a Los Angeles hospital, the grievance reveals.
On Could 9, Sheriff’s Division investigators confirmed up at Paulo’s Palmdale residence with a search warrant. She says they handcuffed her and her husband and took custody of her grandchildren.
Dewees, the final particular person to be seen with the newborn, had already been in custody in Utah for 48 hours on the time of the search.
“I requested them am I being arrested? They stated no, so why am I being detained?” Paulo stated.
Paulo stated she was taken to the Sheriff’s Division’s Palmdale station, questioned for hours and saved in custody till 5 a.m. on Could 10. A spokesman for the Sheriff’s Division stated that Paulo agreed to be questioned and stated the matter was dealt with correctly.
By Could 14, investigators had been looking the Antelope Valley Landfill for Baki’s stays. A regulation enforcement official stated detectives imagine Baki might have been significantly injured as early as Could 2 whereas in his father’s custody, however he was by no means taken to a hospital.
Dewees was seen driving and visiting different places round Los Angeles County with Baki on Could 3. The legal grievance made public on Wednesday indicated that Baki was in all probability useless by that point.
“Youngster abuse has no place in our society and such acts of violence are past the pale, Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. George Gascón stated in a press release. “Kids are among the most susceptible in our society, and each little one is entitled to security and safety as a human proper.”
The Sheriff’s Division has but to search out Baki’s stays, and officers warned that they could by no means be recovered.
Of Baki’s surviving family, two of the youngsters at the moment are within the custody of DCFS — the company Paulo says failed them within the first place.
Instances employees author Keri Blakinger contributed to this report.
