
Dustin Lilley, 29, of Connellsville, Pennsylvania. [Image credit: KDKA]
Dustin Robert Lilley will find out whether or not he will be spending his 30th birthday behind bars the day before at his preliminary hearing on September 22 before District Judge Ronald Haggerty Jr.
Lilley has been in custody since September 8 when he was arrested and charged with two counts of aggravated assault, simple assault, recklessly endangering another person and endangering the welfare of children. He was booked into the Fayette County Jail in lieu of $25,000 bond.
According to a court records search, Lilley is not a stranger to the court system. Previously though, most of his infractions had been vehicle offenses.
The charges he faces now stem from an incident of abuse which occurred at the end of July.
“The boyfriend woke the mom up, claiming the baby was not breathing, believed it was choking on something,” said trooper Robert Broadwater. “They did transport to the hospital. While en route to the hospital, the mother was performing CPR on the child.”
Eventually the child was transferred to the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center Children's Hospital where doctors discovered that the two-month-old infant had suffered a brain hemorrhage, broken ribs, broken blood vessels in his eyes, and bruises all over his body. Some of the injuries that the child had suffered were found to be in the process of healing.
When interviewed by law enforcement, Lilley is said to have told them that the child had merely crawled off of the couch and fell.
“These injuries are not matching up with a child falling off the couch,” the trooper said.
The mother is not facing charges, and doctors have stated that the child has a long and difficult road ahead but that he is expected to recover.