Man convicted of murdering girl, 2
By Michael Zeigler
Democrat and Chronicle
(Wednesday, June 6, 2001) -- He was only trying to discipline his 2-year-old stepdaughter for soiling her underpants, Jesse Jamison told Rochester police.
But Monroe County Court jurors, who heard testimony that Cedreana "C.C." Williams was hit so hard in the abdomen that her internal organs were torn apart and compressed against her spine, convicted Jamison yesterday of second-degree murder.
Jurors found that Jamison acted with "depraved indifference to human life" in the death of Cedreana, who was killed Nov. 5 in her home at 11 Day Place.
Judge Elma A. Bellini scheduled sentencing for July 23. Jamison, 23, could be sent to prison for 25 years to life.
Before his trial began last week, he turned down an offer to plead guilty and receive a sentence of 15 years to life, the minimum penalty for murder.
"He just didn't care. He just didn't give a damn about Cedreana. That's what this case is about," Assistant District Attorney Douglas A. Randall told jurors before they began deliberating.
Although not denying that Jamison killed the girl, defense lawyer Richard Miller argued that he showed compassion when he comforted the girl's mother and called 911 after the child was found unconscious on the floor next to her bunk bed.
Jamison, who was baby-sitting the girl and three siblings, initially told homicide investigators that he spanked the girl five times when she twice wet herself and defecated in clean underpants.
But after he learned that the girl was dead, Jamison hyperventilated, fell to the floor and vomited, then said he hit the girl so hard that she bounced off the wooden bed frame and fell to the floor, crying and convulsing.
"She was grabbing her stomach and her feet came up off the floor," he told police in a statement. "I hit her a couple of more times while she was laying on the floor."
After pulling the girl into bed by one arm, Jamison went to a friend's for 3 ø hours, leaving a 5-year-old in charge of Cedreana and two other children who were 1 and 3. He returned shortly before his wife was to return home from work.
By Michael Zeigler
Democrat and Chronicle
(Wednesday, June 6, 2001) -- He was only trying to discipline his 2-year-old stepdaughter for soiling her underpants, Jesse Jamison told Rochester police.
But Monroe County Court jurors, who heard testimony that Cedreana "C.C." Williams was hit so hard in the abdomen that her internal organs were torn apart and compressed against her spine, convicted Jamison yesterday of second-degree murder.
Jurors found that Jamison acted with "depraved indifference to human life" in the death of Cedreana, who was killed Nov. 5 in her home at 11 Day Place.
Judge Elma A. Bellini scheduled sentencing for July 23. Jamison, 23, could be sent to prison for 25 years to life.
Before his trial began last week, he turned down an offer to plead guilty and receive a sentence of 15 years to life, the minimum penalty for murder.
"He just didn't care. He just didn't give a damn about Cedreana. That's what this case is about," Assistant District Attorney Douglas A. Randall told jurors before they began deliberating.
Although not denying that Jamison killed the girl, defense lawyer Richard Miller argued that he showed compassion when he comforted the girl's mother and called 911 after the child was found unconscious on the floor next to her bunk bed.
Jamison, who was baby-sitting the girl and three siblings, initially told homicide investigators that he spanked the girl five times when she twice wet herself and defecated in clean underpants.
But after he learned that the girl was dead, Jamison hyperventilated, fell to the floor and vomited, then said he hit the girl so hard that she bounced off the wooden bed frame and fell to the floor, crying and convulsing.
"She was grabbing her stomach and her feet came up off the floor," he told police in a statement. "I hit her a couple of more times while she was laying on the floor."
After pulling the girl into bed by one arm, Jamison went to a friend's for 3 ø hours, leaving a 5-year-old in charge of Cedreana and two other children who were 1 and 3. He returned shortly before his wife was to return home from work.