Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, December 7, 1994 TAG: 9412070131
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK
DATELINE: LENGTH: Short
Simone Ann Ayton, 22, was being held Tuesday night in the Roanoke City Jail in lieu of a $10,000 bond.
On Monday, Ayton was indicted by a grand jury on charges that she killed her 7-month-old son, Darius Akeem Ayton, by holding him underwater in a bathtub until he stopped struggling.
When police arrived at Ayton's Ferncliff Avenue apartment the night of Nov.1, she told them her son had accidentally slipped from her arms into the bathtub, and that she was not able to get him out for several minutes.
Ayton, who has a physical handicap that limits the use of one of her hands, was not charged immediately, but authorities decided to seek a murder indictment after she made a statement to a police detective.
Sources have said that Ayton was frustrated with her son's crying at the time of the incident. No one else was in the apartment at the time, and the infant was dead when rescue workers arrived at the apartment about 6:45 p.m.
At the time, Ayton told police that she had carried the baby into a bedroom and tried unsuccessfully to revive him for about 15 minutes before calling for help.
Keywords:
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by CNB