Alaska News

Mother of dead Alaska child charged with domestic violence assault

A 3-year-old child is dead and another in the hospital with critical injuries following an incident that occurred in Barrow last week. The children's mother and boyfriend are charged with second degree assault in the case, but police are cautioning people not to jump to conclusions about the nature of the case.

Media reports that the children were beaten have drawn a strong response from law enforcement officers involved in the case.

"My office has never released any information about anyone being beaten," said North Slope Borough Chief of Police Leon Boyea. "Under the second-degree assault statute, you could be charged for physically creating an environment in which someone was seriously physically injured. It doesn't always mean you were struck."

While Boyea said his office cannot release many of the details of the incident because the investigation is ongoing, some basic information is known.

On Feb 2, police received a 911 call requesting an ambulance to respond to a Momeganna Street apartment for a child that was reportedly not breathing. According to the police department's initial release, officers found a 3-year-old child who did not have a pulse and was not breathing. Officers administered life-saving efforts until medics arrived on scene. The officers also located a second child, age 1, who needed life-saving emergency medical attention.

Both children were transported to Samuel Simmonds Memorial Hospital, where attempts to save their lives continued. The children were later medivaced to the Alaska Native Medical Center in Anchorage.

The 3-year-old's death was reported to the North Slope Police Department on Saturday.

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The child's remains have been sent to the Alaska State Medical Examiner's Office for an autopsy to determine the cause of death.

Richard Tilden Jr., 28, was at the residence when officers arrived. He was arrested and charged with two counts of second-degree domestic violence assault, a felony. The same charges were also issued concurrently for Esther Edwards-Gust, 28, the mother of the children, however she was not arrested until Monday, when Anchorage police took her into custody. She was later released, according to media reports, however Boyea said he did not know the details of why she was released. Court records do not show any bail being posted by Edwards-Gust.

Both were charged under the subsection of the second-degree assault pertaining to a person "recklessly causing serious physical injury to another person" but not the section pertaining to "intent to cause physical injury to another person, that person causes physical injury to another person by means of a dangerous instrument."

Bootlegger also charged

In the process of the investigation into the assault, police determined that Tilden had illegally obtained alcohol from a Barrow resident, Samisoni Kilifi Fotukava, 20.

Officers served a search warrant at 1:04 a.m. on Saturday at 1340 Kongek St. in Barrow. Fotukava was present at the time the warrant was served. Officers seized seven bottles of whiskey, 10 liters of wine and four cases of beer, with an estimated street value of $1,450.

Fotukava was arrested for violating the license or permit required statute, a felony offense punishable by up to five years in jail and up to $50,000 in fines.

Boyea said the investigation indicates alcohol was a factor in the assault case involving the two young children, and said people need to recognize that bootlegging is not a victimless crime.

"We work with numerous assault cases that are alcohol-related, sexual assault cases that are alcohol-related, burglaries and deaths that are alcohol related," he said.

"Other people suffer as a result of the illegal alcohol trade. Alcohol plays a role in a lot of incidents."

Police express frustration as investigation continues

Boyea said he has been frustrated by the misinformation spread by media reports of this crime as well as a shooting incident in Barrow last week. He said the misinformation spreading through the community could compromise the ability for the accused to get a fair trial.

"We are in the preliminary throes of an investigation at this time," he said. "I put as much information in the press releases as I feel comfortable releasing at this time."

Boyea said information gathered by the department has been forwarded to the local district attorney's office, where decisions will be made about future charges now that a death has occurred. He said he anticipated that charges of second-degree murder are likely, but until that happens, Tilden is being held on the original assault charges.

Richard Tilden, who has, according to court records, lived in the Dillingham area up until last year, has been charged with numerous alcohol-related crimes over the past decade, including driving under the influence and furnishing alcohol to a minor as well as charges of fourth-degree assault, vehicle theft and a 2006 charge of domestic violence filed by Tilden's late wife, Michelene Tilden.

Edwards-Gust, reportedly a teacher in Barrow, had a sentence suspended for a charge of driving under the influence from December, but the new assault charges are a violation of her parole, so a warrant was issued for her arrest this week. She is scheduled to be arraigned today on those charges.

Tilden is being held in the local jail on $100,000 bail.

This article was originally published in The Arctic Sounder and is reprinted here with permission.

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