Man arrested in connection with 2013 beating death of 4-year-old

BROCKTON, Mass. (MyFoxBoston.com) -- A mother and her 32-year-old boyfriend have been charged in the June 2013 beating death of a 4-year-old boy.

Antonio Durham, who was dating the child's mother, is charged with murder. Tania Merisca, the boy's mother, is charged with being an accessory after the fact of the commission of a felony.

The pair were staying at the Holiday Inn Express in Brockton at the time of the boy's death. Merisca said she left the hotel when she had to go to work, and called to check in on her son.

"I called on my break. I'm like what y'all doing?" said Merisca on June 3, 2013, the day after her son's death. "He was just watching TV, laying down, playing with his Leap Pad. He said he was fine so I didn't think that anything was wrong."

Merisca said that when she got back to the hotel, she noticed the boy wasn't feeling well and decided to give him a bath when he went white, and had no pulse. That is when Merisca said she took him to Good Samaritan Medical Center. He was unresponsive and pronounced dead less than an hour later.

The medical examiner determined the cause of death to be blunt force trauma to the abdomen, and the manner of death was homicide.

District Attorney Cruz said that after a long investigation that included interviewing witnesses and examining forensic and medical evidence, case investigators obtained arrest warrants Wednesday.

Durham was arrested in Fall River on Monday afternoon. Police arrested Merisca in Brockton on the same day.

Both will be arraigned Tuesday in Brockton District Court.

Cox Media Group