A mother has been charged with felony murder after Atlanta police accused her of driving her car into a vehicle that her 3-month-old baby was in, causing the child’s death.
Titayanna Phillips, 21, of Atlanta, is also charged with aggravated assault in the case, police spokesman Officer Steve Avery confirmed to AJC.com.
Credit: Channel 2 Action News
Credit: Channel 2 Action News
Investigators said Phillips intentionally struck the vehicle Monday evening after the child’s father placed her inside and started to drive away, AJC.com previously reported.
Officers were sent to Chappell Road near Eason Street in northwest Atlanta about 7 p.m., police said. When officers arrived, the baby and the child’s father were both injured inside one of the cars.
The infant, identified as Khy’undra Henderson, was taken to a hospital in critical condition, Avery said. She was later pronounced dead. Her father, 27-year-old Undra Henderson, is stable but remains in the hospital.
Witnesses told Channel 2 Action News that Phillips stood by and even made a phone call as firefighters scrambled to remove her daughter and her child’s father from the mangled vehicle.
Credit: Channel 2 Action News
Credit: Channel 2 Action News
“The car was turned sideways over here against the tree and she was ramming her car into the side of (it),” neighbor Tarangela Jones told the news station. “She was screaming, ‘I told him I’d kill him,’ and then she was like, ‘Can y’all get my baby out of the car?‘”
Phillips had at least two run-ins with officers in recent weeks, according to Atlanta police records.
She was arrested on a disorderly conduct charge in late June after police responded to a domestic dispute at her home on Eason Street, according to an incident report. In that case, Henderson told officers he was forced to jump from the staircase after Phillips attacked him on the stairwell during an argument.
Then on Friday morning, police were called to a health clinic on York Avenue after employees said Phillips, who did not have custody of her daughter, took the baby out of an examination room and left in a waiting car, records show.
Henderson attended the doctor’s appointment with Phillips, who was listed in the report as his ex-girlfriend.
According to the report, Phillips had an open case with the Division of Family and Children’s Services and “numerous current mental and physical health issues which remain unresolved.”
Responding officers repeatedly called Phillips and “pleaded” with her to bring her daughter back to the doctor’s office, police said. She eventually agreed and returned the baby unharmed, according to the report.
Records show Phillips was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital after returning the child, but she wasn’t charged.
She was booked Tuesday into the Fulton County Jail, where she remains without bond, online records show.
