Branson’s Davis charged with child abuse following Republic incident

A Branson man was arrested by Republic police officers on Thursday, Feb. 20 on charges that he allegedly abused an infant by shaking it. Eddie Dwayne Davis, 23, is charged with abuse or neglect of a child, a class B felony in Missouri.
According to the probable cause statement in the case, Davis was watching three children who had been put into foster care with a Republic resident, identified as a woman whom had previously been in a relationship with Davis. According to the statement, the woman had a job with random hours, and Davis would sometimes watch the children for her while she was at work.
The woman reported she went to work in the morning hours of Wednesday, Feb. 19; leaving Davis to watch the children. When she returned, she said she discovered the youngest child, an infant, was very lethargic, and she took the child to the hospital, where she was told the baby had a brain bleed, consistent with a “shaken baby.”
A doctor who assessed the baby told the officer investigating the case that the baby’s injuries consisted of “bleeding around the brain, stroke-like findings, and bruises to his right collar and left eye and under the chin.” The doctor stated he believed the injuries were consistent with possible child abuse.
Republic police officers removed the other two children from the house, and also took Davis into custody; they reported finding him lying in the bedroom, and “his eyes appeared to be red as if he had been crying.”
According to the probable cause statement, Davis agreed to a post-Miranda interview with the investigating officer. At first, he denied causing any harm to the child, after which the officer asked him to take a Computer Voice Stress Analyzer (CVSA) test, to which he agreed.
During the CVSA test, the officer asked Davis, “Did you inflict the injuries to (the child)?” and “Did you shake (the child) causing injuries. The officer reported Davis showed signs of deception during the CVSA.
The officer reported Davis continued to deny shaking the baby while discussing the results of the CVSA.      
The officer said she told him she knew it was scary, but she knew he was being deceptive because of the test results. The officer also told him “that people were more apt to forgive someone that showed remorse than someone that did not.”
After a brief pause, Davis reportedly said “I’m 100-percent responsible” for the child’s injuries. He told the officer that watching the children was too much for him, but he did not want to let down the woman fostering them.
Davis said that on Feb. 19, the children were “misbehaving, coloring on the walls with markers, spilling drinks on the floor, and (the infant) would not stop fussing and crying.” Davis said he picked up the child and “shook him”; he said he “didn’t mean to inflict injury, but rather he was just overwhelmed with the responsibility of the children.”
Davis also said he “needed help with his drug problem, his depression and his anger management,” stating he could not do it himself anymore, and “he needed the courts to help with such.” He was taken to the Greene County Jail a short time later.
The woman fostering the children said Davis had “shown acts of aggression” towards her when they’d been in a relationship; she described his behavior as “grabbing her by the arms” and shaking or throwing her during arguments, and also said he’d been “verbally abusive.”
As of press time, Davis remained in the Greene County Jail without bond. He is next due in court on Thursday, March 19, for a counsel status hearing.