Attempted Murder Charge For Six-Year Old Baby Beaten When Boy, Two Friends, Stole A Tricycle

A 6-year-old boy was charged with attempted murder and burglary Thursday in the near-fatal beating of an infant during the robbery of a tricycle from the baby’s home.

Contra Costa County Deputy District Attorney Harold Jewett also filed burglary charges against 8-year-old twins who allegedly joined the younger boy in the break-in Monday night.

The three boys, whose names have not been released because of their ages, allegedly wanted to steal a Big Wheel tricycle from the Richmond apartment. They were in juvenile detention pending a custody hearing Friday.

Police said they found the infant asleep in a bassinet, tipped it over and then kicked, punched and possibly hit the baby with a stick before running away with the tricycle.

The infant, Ignacio Bermudez, remained in very critical condition Thursday with skull fractures and bleeding in his brain. He was on a ventilator and anti-seizure medication, and doctors at Children’s Hospital in Oakland were watching closely for any signs of pneumonia because a respirator could cause the baby’s lungs to fill with fluid.

The child has begun to show some deliberate movement, which could be a good sign, but he almost certainly will have some permanent physical and brain damage, Dr. Sharon Williams said.

Speaking out for the first time Thursday, the infant’s parents avoided calling for vengeance.

“I don’t want to see anything happen to that child because he also has a mother and she would suffer very deeply, just as we are suffering,” his father, Ignacio Bermudez, said through a translator.

But he was angry that children were running unsupervised through the neighborhood that night.

Bermudez said he has spent the past few days “crying and thinking.” His wife, Maria Carmen Bermudez, 33, said nothing could take her pain away.

The father, who works for a company that makes fiberglass pipes, moved to California from his native Michoacan state in Mexico in 1974. His wife and children joined him two years ago.

They had been living in their neighborhood without fear until Monday’s beating. Now, they said, they want to move, but can’t afford to.

Ignacio Bermudez said he, his wife and their three other children were out grocery shopping at the time of the beating.

They had not taken young Ignacio along because he had a cough and they worried the chilly evening air would make it worse. Besides, the infant’s 18-year-old stepsister was baby-sitting in another room.

“I never thought I was leaving him unprotected,” Ignacio Bermudez said.