8-26-11
The mother of Nixzmary Brown, Nixzaliz Santiago, just got 7 years knocked off her sentence by a New York appeals court! The reason for the reduction is the courts dismissed one of the assault counts against her that carried 7 years prison. They ruled she was convicted of an assault that she was not indicted for. The assault she was convicted of but not indicted for was tying Nixzmary to a wooden chair. Santiago was originally sentenced to 43 years. She’ll now be serving 33-36 years.
Santiago was convicted of manslaughter and two counts of assault:
1st ASSAULT CT: WOODEN CHAIR WITH BUNGEE CORD The first assault count was for tying little Nixzmary up to a WOODEN CHAIR with a bungee cord. Every time Nixzmary would move the cord would cut into her ankle causing her pain & leaving the area bruised. There were autopsy photos of dark ligature marks around her ankle.
2nd ASSAULT CT: GASH OVER EYE & PUNCHING IN THE EYES WITH FISTS The second assault count covered two things: gash over Nixzmary's right eye and punching her in the eyes with fists. Nixzaliz Santiago was convicted of assault for both.
Here’s the background on those injuries: It was Nixzmary’s stepdad, Cesar Rodriguez, who caused the gash over Nixzmary’s eye. I think Cesar slammed Nixzmary’s head into a windowsill causing that gash – but I’m not sure. It’s been over 3 years so I’d have to recheck my trial notes for exactly how that injury happened. But it was definitely Cesar who caused it. On Nov. 29th 2005, Cesar brought Nixzmary Brown to Woodhull Hospital to have the injury stitched up. (they never brought her back to have the stitches removed so Nixzmary actually died with those stitches) On Dec. 1st 2005, Nixzmary showed up to school with the gash over her eye. ACS was called. When they questioned Nixzmary's siblings about how her injury occured, Nixzmary’s older brother, Javier Batista, lied for his evil stepdad and told ACS Nixzmary fell down. When ACS questioned Nixzmary’s little sister, she told them, “Cesar did it”.
In reference to the black eyes, it was Nixzaliz Santiago who did in fact punch little Nixzmary Brown after she had played a prank on one of her baby brothers.
The main reason Santiago got more time was the judge tacked on an extra 14 years for two assault counts.
One of them was stemmed from Nixzmary being tied to a chair with a bungee cord.
Yet the appeals court found that Santiago was not indicted for that. Instead, the grand jury hit her with an assault rap for smacking the girl with a ruler, a source said.
But the panel tossed one of the assault convictions, saying the acts described in the conviction do not match the charges in the indictment, according to the Aug. 23 decision.
Santiago was found guilty of injuring Nixzmary by tying her to a chair with a bungee cord, but the indictment charged Santiago with causing injury with a ruler.
As it turns out, Nixzaliz Santiago was never indicted for tying Nixzmary Brown to the wooden chair with the bungee cord. Because she was convicted of it, the courts threw the conviction out because it didn’t match the indictment.
Despite the article saying that the indictment charged Santiago with hitting Nixzmary with a RULER - there was no ruler. I’m surprised the courts didn’t pick up on that and throw the 2nd assault charge out too, since Santiago was not convicted of assault with a ruler. The assault happened by way of her fists to punch Nixzmary in the eyes.
I predicted way back in 2008 that one of these charges would be dismissed on appeal. I did think it would be this assault charge for the gash & punch – and not the 1st one that actually was dismissed.
Nixzaliz Santiago will be in her late 60’s by the time she’s released from prison.
In the end, this ruling doesn’t mean much. Nixzmary Brown is still gone, way before her time. A beautiful little life snuffed out by an evil madman and a spineless, heartless woman.
RIP Nixzmary.
Read more:
NY Daily News.Com
NY Post.Com
CHILD ABUSE HEADLINES.COM
- Nixzmary Brown
