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Dad charged with St. Paul baby's death
Mom tells cops he first told her not to call for help, then to lie that he wasn't home

BY MARA H. GOTTFRIED
Pioneer Press

Destiny Jackson's lips turned blue and she could hardly breathe, but authorities say her father told her mother not to call 911. He assured her Destiny would be fine.

Maeve Clifford made the call anyway. Then, prosecutors allege, Beauford Jackson III told Clifford to lie and tell authorities he wasn't home when their 15-month-old daughter was hurt at their St. Paul apartment. At first, she went along and said Destiny had fallen off a bed.

But when the child died about an hour later, police say, Clifford told the truth. She told police that when she returned from grocery shopping shortly after midnight Monday, she found her daughter injured and saw blood on Jackson's shirt.

Doctors said Destiny couldn't have been hurt so badly falling off a bed. Police and prosecutors agreed, and the Ramsey County attorney's office on Wednesday charged Jackson with second-degree unintentional murder. He was being held in the Ramsey County jail on $1 million bail.

"It is hard to comprehend how a small child, a vulnerable child, can be murdered at the hands of one of their parents," said Ramsey County Attorney Susan Gaertner. "There's just no explanation."

Child protection officials returned Destiny to the care of her 18-year-old parents two weeks before she died. She was put in foster care just after Thanksgiving, when it was discovered she had a skull fracture.

Jackson told police at the time that he had accidentally dropped Destiny, according to the baby's maternal grandmother. Medical evidence couldn't prove that it hadn't been an accident, so he wasn't charged, police said.

Jackson's relatives said they don't believe he killed his daughter.

"I don't think Destiny could have made him that angry to do something like that," said his mother, Sharise Drown.

She questioned whether the injuries had been inflicted in the days before the baby died, while Jackson was not around.

Clifford's mother said she was appalled by details included in the complaint filed Wednesday.

"It seems obvious to me that he will say anything to not accept responsibility and she will go along with it, or in the past she did anyway," Mikel Clifford said.

At first, Maeve Clifford told police Destiny fell off a bed, "popped right up" as though she were fine, but then vomited, the complaint said.

Paramedics called to the couple's apartment in the 1300 block of West Maynard Drive after 12:30 a.m. Tuesday found the child unresponsive and pale; there were bruises on her abdomen, forehead and both sides of her neck, the complaint said.

The Ramsey County medical examiner's office ruled Destiny bled to death from cuts on her liver caused by blunt force injuries to her chest and abdomen.

When police questioned Clifford later at the police department, she admitted "she had concocted the story at the request of Beauford Jackson," the complaint said.

Clifford said she went to Coopers SuperValu at 11:40 or 11:50 p.m. Monday, which investigators verified, the complaint said.

When she returned, Jackson was giving their daughter a bath. She told police she wondered why because the baby had been bathed earlier, the complaint said.

Clifford noticed blood on both shoulders of Jackson's shirt, the complaint said.

Clifford told police she wanted to call 911 immediately, but Jackson told her to calm down. He said the baby would be fine. She called 911 from her cell phone.

Jackson told her he was going to leave and she should tell paramedics and police he hadn't been there earlier, the complaint said. He changed his clothes before paramedics arrived, the complaint said.

Initially, Jackson told police he arrived home when Clifford was on the phone with an emergency dispatcher, the complaint said.

Jackson told an investigator later he came home after the paramedics arrived, according to the complaint. He said he was at his mother's house that afternoon and at the home of a friend, next door to his mother's.

Jackson said he rode Metro Transit buses and video on the buses would prove it, the complaint said. An investigator didn't see him on the tapes.

Police also talked to the man Jackson said he had visited. The man said he hadn't seen Jackson for two to three weeks, the complaint said.

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$750,000 bail set for St. Paul man accused of killing his daughter

StarTribune.com
February 15, 2007

A St. Paul man accused of murdering his 15-month-old daughter made his first court appearance Thursday and was ordered held in the Ramsey County jail in lieu of $750,000 bail.
Beauford Jackson, 18, also was ordered by Judge Edward Wilson to have no contact with Maeve Clifford, the mother of his dead daughter, Destiny. Jackson's next court appearance was set for March 1.

He was charged Wednesday with unintentional second-degree murder in the girl's death early Tuesday. A preliminary autopsy report said the girl died of internal bleeding from lacerations to her liver caused by blows to her chest and abdomen.

Clifford found Destiny pale and having trouble breathing after leaving her for a short time with Jackson Monday night. He asked her to tell authorities that the toddler had fallen off a bed, but she later told police they had concocted that story, according to the complaint. Doctors who examined the girl said that a fall off the bed didn't explain her injuries.

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Father accused of killing daughter admits lying about baby's earlier injury

BY MARA H. GOTTFRIED
Pioneer Press
Feb. 16, 2007

After Destiny Jackson broke her skull, her father lied to police about how she got hurt because "he had gotten much praise from family members and others that he was such a good parent," according to a search warrant filed in court today.

St. Paul police investigated the December injury and Destiny was placed in foster care. County officials returned the child to her 18-year-old parents Jan. 31, after medical evidence couldn't rule out an accidental injury.

On Tuesday, 15-month-old Destiny died from new injuries. Prosecutors charged Beauford Jackson III, Destiny's father, with second-degree unintentional murder. Destiny died of internal injuries after being struck in the torso, an autopsy concluded.

Investigators filed the search warrant to take pictures of where the December injury happened, so medical examiners and medical child safety specialists can review the circumstances of that injury.

Officers were called to Children's Hospitals and Clinics in St. Paul on Dec. 19 about suspected child abuse, according to the application for the search warrant. A doctor told them Jackson and Maeve Clifford, Destiny's mother, had conflicting accounts of how Destiny's skull was fractured, the search warrant application said.

Clifford told officers she, Destiny and Jackson had been sleeping in the same bed at Jackson's mother's house early on Dec. 16 in the 1500 block of L'Orient Street.

At some point, without her knowing, Clifford said Jackson had gotten out of bed and gone downstairs to watch television, the application said. Destiny had been sleeping between her parents and Clifford said she believed Destiny rolled off the bed and fell on the floor, about two feet, the search warrant said.

Clifford said she heard a thump and Destiny crying. She picked Destiny up and looked her over, but she didn't see any bruises, the warrant said.

During the following day, Destiny's behavior went from "very mellow and happy to extremely cranky," Clifford said. She later noticed the right side of Destiny's head was swollen, the application said.

Jackson told officers he hadn't been there when Destiny was injured and, as soon as he found out about the swelling from Clifford, he called 911, the application said. Paramedics took the baby to the hospital.

On Dec. 20, a sergeant from the police's family and sexual violence unit and a Ramsey County child protection worker interviewed both parents at the police department. Both parents maintained the injury was caused by the fall from the bed, but were "confronted with the evidence that the injury … could not have occurred in the manner they described," the application said.

Because the injury couldn't be explained, the sergeant went to the hospital and placed a protective hold on Destiny and she went to a foster home, the application said.

During a later interview, Clifford said her initial explanation wasn't "accurate and was meant as an attempt to explain the injury and avoid scrutiny," the application said.

Clifford and Jackson voluntarily agreed to take polygraph tests. Clifford's show "no significant criteria" indicating she was deceiving police, but Jackson's showed "significant criteria," the application said.

As a result of the finding, Jackson was interviewed again on Jan. 31. He told police that when he was given the polygraph, "he wanted to tell the examiner not to waste his time with the polygraph. He said he was really scared and thought he would get locked up if he told the truth," the application said.

Jackson told the child protection worker he had been at his mother's home alone with Destiny on Dec. 16. He was upstairs when a telephone rang, put Destiny on his shoulders and ran down the stairs to answer it, the application said.

There is an overhang above the stairs, which Jackson said he wasn't thinking about, the application said. Destiny hit the overhang, fell back off his shoulders and her head hit the stairs, the application said. He said dropping Destiny was an accident.

Destiny was "screaming and screaming" and Jackson held her, trying to stop her from crying, the application said. Jackson didn't tell anyone what happened.

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Parents lied about baby's skull fracture
A dead St. Paul child's parents admitted they hid the truth about an earlier incident in which the 15-month-old girl was hurt.

By Paul Gustafson
Star Tribune
February 16, 2007

St. Paul police say that two young parents lied this week about injuries to their 15-month-old daughter that led to her death Tuesday.
If so, it wasn't the first time, according to court documents filed Friday.

Maeve Clifford, the 18-year-old mother of Destiny Jackson, told authorities in December that her daughter had fractured her skull by falling off a bed. And the toddler's father, Beauford Jackson, also 18, said that he hadn't been there when the accident occurred.

But two weeks ago, after a polygraph test indicated that Jackson had been deceptive, he told authorities a different story -- that he had been running down the stairs with Destiny on his shoulders to answer the phone when she hit her head on an overhang and fell on the stairway.

Doctors considered Jackson's new story more consistent with Destiny's injuries, and the toddler was released the same day to her mother from foster care, where she had been placed after the skull fracture.

Jackson was charged Wednesday with unintentional second-degree murder in Destiny's death, and is being held in Ramsey County jail in lieu of $750,000 bail.

In both the case of Destiny's skull fracture and the injuries leading to her death this week, authorities say that Clifford also initially lied when she said her daughter had fallen off a bed and that Jackson wasn't present for either incident.

But authorities declined to say Friday whether charges against Clifford are being considered.

The medical examiner's staff determined that Destiny bled to death Tuesday after blows to her chest and abdomen lacerated her liver.

Only after police told Clifford that her daughter couldn't have suffered such injuries from a fall off a bed did the young mother say she had returned from the grocery store around midnight Monday to find Jackson with a bloody shirt and her daughter pale and having trouble breathing, the complaint says.

In the wake of Destiny's death, St. Paul police Sgt. Paul Schnell said that investigators are taking a fresh look at the girl's skull fracture two months ago.

New story was plausible

On Jan. 31, Jackson acknowledged to a child protection worker that Destiny had fallen off his shoulders while he was running downstairs at his mother's St. Paul house, the search warrant affidavit says.

Even though the toddler "screamed and screamed" after the fall, Beauford told the child protection worker, he said that he did not seek medical help and that he told no one what happened because he was afraid his family and friends would think he was a bad parent, according to the affidavit.

After her skull fracture, police and child protection officials removed Destiny from her mother and placed her in foster care.

Clifford later told authorities that her initial explanation of the skull fracture -- that Jackson was watching TV downstairs when Destiny fell out of an upstairs bed -- was an attempt to explain the injury while avoiding scrutiny.

But even that story conflicted with Jackson's claim that he was not in the house when the girl fell, Schnell said.

Doctors at St. Paul Children's Hospital who treated Destiny's skull fracture on Dec. 19 called police to report possible child maltreatment, saying that her parents had given contradictory stories and provided an explanation of the child's injury that conflicted with medical evidence.

But Jackson's Jan. 31 explanation of Destiny's injuries was plausible, the doctors told police, according to Walsh.

Police and child protection officials jointly decided to return the girl to her mother because they "were not able to demonstrate that there was malicious intent or even negligence," he said.

Ramsey County child protection officials did not return telephone calls seeking comment Friday. They have said that state and federal law prohibits them for commenting on specific cases.