AURORA | An Aurora man who pleaded guilty early this year to fatally head-butting his infant son has asked to withdraw his guilty plea.
Martin Holguin Jr. was set for sentencing last week in Adams County District Court, but asked the judge to allow him to withdraw his plea, according to prosecutors. The judge set a status conference in the case for next month.
It wasn’t clear why Holguin, 25, wanted to withdraw the deal that he accepted from prosecutors in January. Under the terms of that agreement, Holguin pleaded guilty to child abuse resulting in death and faced between 20 and 32 years in prison. The plea deal came just before Holguin’s trial was set to start.
According to testimony from police and prosecutors at a hearing last year, Holguin admitted to head butting his 3-month-old son, Aiden, but said he didn’t realize the blow could be fatal.
In an arrest affidavit filed against Holguin in 2013, police said officers responded to the home Sept. 15, 2013, on a report of an unresponsive infant. There, emergency crews found the tot unconscious and rushed him to nearby Children’s Hospital Colorado.
Hospital staff later discovered a Y-shaped fracture on the boy’s skull just above his ear and said he suffered severe head trauma.
Initially, Holguin told investigators that he had no idea what could have happened to the boy. He told police Aiden had been fussy for a few days and was sitting in a bouncy chair in the living room when he suddenly had what looked like a seizure.
A day after Aiden was rushed to the hospital, Holguin seemed angry when police asked him if he struck his son and went on to tell police that the tot’s injuries may have been the result of the baby accidentally hitting his head on Holguin’s a few days earlier, or the boy accidentally hitting his head on a door jam.
Police spoke to medical experts who said it wasn’t possible for the boy’s injuries to have been caused the way his dad said they were.
Police interviewed Holguin again a few weeks later and he told them he head-butted Aiden, but he insisted it wasn’t intended to hurt the boy and he didn’t know it could be fatal.
It isn’t clear whether the judge will allow Holguin to change his plea. In the same courthouse last year, a man accused of kidnapping a girl from her north Aurora home asked to scrap a plea agreement he already struck with prosecutors and the judge rejected the request.
What a monster. Killed his own 3 month old infant son with a head butt, my God almighty, save us from those among us who are unable to even think rationally. Head butting an infant to death, think on that people.
From head butting his child to imprisoned and getting heads rammed in his butt. Hope you enjoy a long, cold jail sentence. Vaya con Dios punta!