Nanny sued for child abuse

A Nepalese woman is standing trial for allegations that she intentionally dropped a nine-month old child on the floor while baby-sitting the infant on February 29, 2000.

Parents of the child caught the alleged abuse on a recorded home video installed inside the master bedroom in their San Vicente home.

During a bench trial in Associate Judge Virginia Sablan-Onerheim’s courtroom yesterday, the couple in separate testimonies stated that after coming home from work that day, they reviewed the afternoon tape which showed footage of defendant Manju Pandey dropping their child twice on the floor.

The child’s mother told the court of what she saw on tape, which to her appeared to be Ms. Pandey trying to bottle-feed her child who apparently did not want to be fed at that time.

“She continued to try to feed the baby, but she didn’t want to be fed, so she walked towards the crib and dropped the baby on the floor. She walked away and came back again and dropped the baby on the floor for the second time,” the mother said on the witness stand.

She further noted that Ms. Pandey even pinched the baby’s nose, as a portion of the video showed.

After the couple finished reviewing the tape on Feb. 29 last year, they immediately sought for police assistance.

Police officers who responded to the emergency call also had the opportunity to view the tape. They were each called to the witness stand yesterday to attest to what they saw.

The defense and prosecution panels were given turns to conduct the direct and cross examinations on the witnesses, including Dr. Laura Post, an expert psychiatrist working for the Division of Corrections.

The defense panel through counsel Stephen J. Nutting brought Dr. Post to the stand to deliver an opinion about the contents of the videotape.

Before taking to the witness stand yesterday, the expert which carried with her long years of experience in the field psychiatry, took time to research about child abuse on the Internet and the library.

In her testimony, she was given the chance to air her “perceptions” about the defendant’s actions on tape, which she qualified as “deliberate” behavior on the part of Ms. Pandey.

Emergency records provided by the hospital when the baby was admitted for evaluation last year showed that the infant sustained no obvious injuries, except for slight bruises across her nasal bridge.

The final diagnosis, as Dr. Post read through the file, revealed that the child was healthy and that no signs of significant injuries were detected.

By examining the records alone, the expert said she would not have felt the obligation to report to authorities that the case was possibly child abuse.

“Seeing the video tape, I am even more convinced there isn’t child abuse because I have not seen the intention on tape,” she informed the court.

The government’s case against Ms. Pandey continues before Judge Onerheim’s bench today.