Report: 5-year-old son dies after whipping by father for talking back, not going to bed
LAS VEGAS (KVVU/Gray News) - A father in the Las Vegas area is under arrest and facing a murder charge with connection to the death of his 5-year-old son earlier this week.
On Thursday, Gerald Oglesby, 33, was taken into Henderson police custody after authorities were called to his apartment and found his son dead, reported by KVVU.
The child stopped breathing after being whipped by Oglesby with a cable box cord, according to a Henderson police arrest report.
The 33-year-old told police that his son was watching a TV show that he wasn’t supposed to watch and back talked before using the cord, splitting the child’s chin open.
Oglesby reportedly whipped the child again later that Wednesday night because the child didn’t want to go to bed, the report said, while also hitting the child in the abdomen with a slipper.
Oglesby told police he knew he hit the child too hard as the child wasn’t acting normal and laid down. The child vomited a short time later, according to the report.
The arrest report continued, reporting Oglesby could tell something was wrong but didn’t want to call the police because they would not understand his method of discipline.
According to the report, Oglesby performed CPR but got no response and realized the child was dead. He then texted the child’s mother a couple of good pictures stored on his phone and texted the sister that the boy died because he had whipped him too hard.
The boy’s father started smoking marijuana before calling 911, with him calling emergency responders around 1:30 a.m. Thursday, according to the report. Oglesby said the last time the child was breathing was 13 minutes before the 911 call.
Oglesby told police that 911 dispatchers instructed him on how to do CPR but he refused because he had already tried it and it didn’t work, according to the report.
Police report officers observed visible injuries to the head and torso of the child once they arrived. The child was pronounced dead at the scene.
A neighbor said she heard loud noises that she believed was a body being thrown onto the ground in the apartment, according to the police report, and thumping noises continued for two hours. She also said she tried to contact the resident in the apartment but no one answered. The neighbor didn’t call 911.
Oglesby told police he was awarded custody of his son in February 2021 and started using physical discipline around that time. He also said he was forced to discipline his son by whipping him with a phone charging cord in December 2021 because of back talking.
Court records show Oglesby’s next court appearance is scheduled for March 21.
Copyright 2022 KVVU via Gray Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
