Madrid’s lawyer calls tot’s death an accident

CENTENNIAL |From his first conversations with police, Ted Madrid admitted he caused the injuries that killed his girlfriend’s 2-year-old

son, his lawyer said Wednesday.

During opening statements in Madrid’s first-degree murder trial, public defender Evan Zuckerman said Madrid had been honest with police throughout the case, telling them he was drunk, that he played too rough with the boy and that he didn’t call for help right away.

“He never runs away, never runs away from what he did because it was an accident,” Zuckerman told the jury.

Madrid told police he was babysitting Caden and while the two were roughhousing, he tried to throw the tot onto a bed. He missed the bed, though, and Caden struck his head, knocking him unconscious. The boy never regained consciousness and later died at an area hospital.

Zuckerman urged the jury not to get overwhelmed by the emotional nature of the case, and focus on the fact that Madrid didn’t mean to hurt Caden that night in January 2011.

“It was an accident, it wasn’t murder,” she said.

But prosecutors said that while Madrid may not have wanted to kill Caden, the boy’s death wasn’t an accident, either. Madrid’s failure to call 911 for 90 minutes after Caden hit his head lead to the toddler’s death, prosecutors said.

Deputy District Attorney Cara Morlan said it’s impossible to know if Caden could have been saved had he gotten help sooner, but she said doctors will testify that quick treatment for a head injury is vital.

“In these situations, every minute counts,” she said.

Morlan said Madrid knew two things after Caden hit his head: that the tot was in serious trouble, and that Madrid likely was, too.

“That night, he made a choice, he made a choice to save himself rather than that child,” she said.

Rather than call 911, Madrid tried to revive Caden by running cold water over his face, Morlan said. Then he started scrubbing blood stains off the carpet and trying to stop Caden’s wound from bleeding.

“He let that child lie there for over an hour because he didn’t want to get in trouble,” she said.

Once Caden’s mother arrived home and found the boy injured, she immediately called 911, prosecutors said.

Morlan said that when police asked Madrid the next day whether he though it would have mattered if he called 911 earlier, he said it wouldn’t because he would still be in trouble. That’s telling, Morlan said, because it shows Madrid was still more concerned about getting in trouble than about Caden’s well being.

But Zuckerman said Madrid and Caden had a good relationship and he only played rough with Caden that night because he wanted the boy to be tough.

“They were buddies,” she said.

A few days earlier, Caden was with another toddler who picked on him, biting the boy several times, Zuckerman said. After that, Madrid decided the boy needed to be tougher.

“Ted wanted to toughen-up the little guy so he wouldn’t get hurt,” she said.

Zuckerman said one of the witnesses during the trial will be a physicist who will testify that Madrid’s explanation of what happened to Caden that night was plausible.

Madrid, wearing a light-blue shirt, khaki pants and a dark-blue tie, sat quietly next to his lawyers throughout the opening statements.

The jury of seven men and six women listened intently during the opening arguments. Before the trial started, Judge Carlos Samour dismissed one juror who said missing work for jury duty would be too much of a financial strain. That left  the jury with just one alternate instead of two.

Several people close to Rodgers’ family sat in the courtroom Wednesday. Many, however, are not allowed in the courtroom because they may be called as witnesses later in the trial, including Caden’s mother.

Madrid was arrested a short time after Caden’s injuries and has been in jail since. If convicted of first-degree murder, he faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

The trial is scheduled to last two weeks.