A Baxter County Circuit Court jury found Snow guilty of first degree battery and endangering the welfare of a minor.
The infant was born January 27th last year. The 20-year-old Jonathan Snow is the father and the mother is 31-year-old Alyssia Kirby-Snow. At the time of the baby’s birth, the couple lived together in an apartment complex along State Highway 201 North. They have since married according to statements made in open court by Alyssia Kirby-Snow.
The mother also faces charges and her case remains active in Circuit Court.
Charges were filed against the Snows as the result of an investigation launched in late February last year when the Mountain Home Police Department received a report from Arkansas Children’s Hospital in Little Rock that it was believed the baby — Alyas Snow — had suffered serious abuse.
The hospital reported that the infant, who had been listed in critical condition while in the Little Rock pediatric hospital, had lost two pounds since his birth, suffered a fracture to the right clavicle, had sustained numerous bruises as well as bleeding and swelling of the brain, and the infant was suffering seizures.
In the option of the medical team which examined the baby, there is no scenario in which a single drop or fall would result in the infant’s extensive, widespread injuries. According to court records, the parents provided nothing but guesses as to how the infant sustained the injuries but the medical team in Little Rock suspected abuse.
Mountain Home physician, Dr. Michael Adkins, testified during the October trial. He became visibly emotional when recounting his contacts with the baby. He said when he had first seen Alyas Snow the baby had been what he termed a “well child”. He said, however, that when Alyssia Kirby-Snow brought the baby to his office slightly more than two weeks later, he was essentially looking at a “lifeless” child. Dr. Adkins said the baby had bruises around the head and showed other abnormal symptoms, such as tremors. Dr. Adkins said he immediately called for an ambulance to get the child to the Baxter Regional Medical Center emergency room. The baby was then airlifted to Arkansas Children’s after it suffered a seizure in the BRMC emergency room.Defense attorney, Andrew Bailey, told the jury before they began deliberations that his client was a teenager who did not know what to do when his son began exhibiting signs of seizures and other medical problems. Bailey told the jury, “He was doing what he knew to do and he did a bad job in terms of caring for his son, but this does not make him a criminal”.
Bailey said Alyssia Kirby-Snow was the “better candidate” in terms of being the one responsible for the injuries.
One of the most dramatic points in Snow’s trial came when Alyas Snow was brought into the courtroom by his foster mother for jurors to see the results of injuries the boy sustained and the handicaps he will live with for the remainder of his life due to those injuries. The foster mother told the court the small boy could not talk, was unable to walk, could only briefly hold his head up and was fed through a tube. He is required to make visits to various clinics at Arkansas Children’s Hospital once or twice a month, according to the foster mother.
Snow is being represented by Gary Potts, an attorney in Monticello, in his appeal process
At the current time, Snow is shown as an inmate in the Delta Regional Unit of the State Prison System at Dermott.
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