Shaken Infant Improving 2

Shaken infant improving; grand jury to hear charges against father Saturday, November 18, 2006

By DAVID FERRARA Staff Reporter

An infant girl who suffered near-death injuries just two months ago continues to improve, authorities said Friday, as a domestic violence charge against her father, accused of violently shaking her in their Bon Secour home, was sent to a Baldwin County grand jury. The baby girl, Kandace Hilburn, suffered injuries Sept. 5 that are severe enough to last her entire life, Baldwin County Sheriff's Office investigator Sgt. Tony Nolfe said Friday outside court. Moments earlier, Baldwin County District Court Judge Jody Bishop heard details of the allegations against Ralph Herbert Rammage, 36, a convicted felon who also faces a parole violation charge. Rammage told authorities he became agitated when the child, 3 months old at the time, would not stop crying, Nolfe said. The father called 911 when the girl went into a seizure, according to the investigator. Nolfe called the child's injuries "classic symptoms" of shaken baby syndrome. Kandace suffered bleeding in her brain, behind her eyes, almost total loss of vision, loss of hearing and the loss of reflexes. She also suffered a broken leg and bruising in various other locations of her body, authorities said. When she was hospitalized, Kandace could not swallow or suckle, Nolfe said. Defense attorney Brian A. Dasinger said Kandace was born anemic, or with a red blood cell deficiency, and "predisposed to more medical issues than a normal child." At some point that day, Dasinger argued, Kandace had stopped breathing. "We think that (her medical condition) contributed to injuries the child sustained when my client tried to revive the child," Dasinger said. Nolfe called that argument "fundamentally wrong." "This is an injury," he said. "This isn't a medical condition." Investigators received a confession from Rammage, Nolfe added, in which he told authorities that he wanted the child's mother to take care of her, but the mother was working at the time and away from home. At the time, authorities said they weren't sure whether Kandace would survive. But in the more than two months since the incident, the child's condition has improved, Nolfe said. She can now see bright light and hear certain frequencies of sound, according to the investigator. The long-lasting effects of her injuries, however, may not yet be known, he added. "Only when she isn't saying her first words or isn't taking her first steps ... will we know," Nolfe said. Rammage, who was being held in the Baldwin County Corrections Center in Bay Minette on $1 million bond, faces life in prison if convicted.