DENVER — A Denver jury has found a 37-year-old man guilty of killing a 3-year-old boy in September 2018.
John Affourtit was found guilty on March 3 of first-degree murder of a victim under 12 by a person in a position of trust, child abuse causing death and reckless endangerment.
He is set for sentencing on April 6.
Affourtit was charged with killing his girlfriend's son at an apartment along the 900 block of S. Dahlia Street. On Sept. 25, 2018 paramedics responded to the apartment after receiving a report that a child was not breathing. The boy was declared dead shortly afterward.
Later that same day, both Affourtit and his girlfriend agreed to cooperate with the investigation and talk with police. Affourtit said his girlfriend and her son had moved in with him in the beginning of August 2018, according to an arrest affidavit. Affourtit said he was currently unemployed and would watch the child while his mother was at work.
Affourtit explained to police that about a week prior, he had been bathing the child and the boy fell in the bathtub. He had a cut on each of his eyes and a "knot" on his head, according to the affidavit. Investigators said this seemed suspicious, as eye lids are usually not injured in falls. The boy then became sick and lethargic, Affourtit told police.
He told police he was feeding the child chili and the boy started to spit it up, with some landing on Affourtit's face. Affourtit said he was angry. His girlfriend then left the apartment with her son and went to her mother's house. Affourtit said she returned later without the boy, according to the affidavit.
Early in the morning, the girlfriend received a call from her mother saying the boy was crying, and she went to pick him up and bring him back to the apartment, Affourtit said, according to the affidavit.
She then went to work and Affourtit said in between watching TV, he checked on the boy. He said around 5 a.m., he found the boy covered in vomit, according to the affidavit. He told police he cleaned the boy up and put him back to sleep, only to find he had thrown up again later. He said he cleaned the boy up again and then he fell asleep, according to the affidavit. Affourtit claimed that he woke up around 3:30 p.m. and found that the boy had died.
In a separate interview, the girlfriend told police she had arrived home around 4 p.m. and went to check on the boy. She told police that she had found him deceased, so she called 911 and started CPR, according to the affidavit.
Investigators said the boy's injuries were consistent with force and were not accidental. According to the affidavit, they included:
- Lacerations on the left and right eyelids
- Possible lacerations under the chin
- Trauma to his right shoulder and possibly a shoulder dislocation
- Frenulum was torn
- Injuries to his inner left leg, top of the right foot, left hand and right ear
- Force trauma to his head and abdomen
A doctor with the Denver Office of the Medical Examiner said the boy also had an infection in his abdomen that was the result of an injury to his small intestine. She said this injury was fatal trauma. She said based on the information she had, the manner of death was a homicide, according to the affidavit.
Affourtit was arrested on Sept. 26, 2018. He was then formally charged.
The Denver Office of the Medical Examiner determined the boy died of blunt force trauma.
