LOCKPORT – Kenneth S. Lathrop Jr. agreed Friday to serve seven years in state prison for permanently injuring his baby son Jan. 8.
Lathrop, 26, of Ruhlman Road, Lockport, pleaded guilty to a charge of reckless assault on a child and admitted that he bounced his 3-month-old son’s head off the bathroom floor and shook him.
Nathan Lathrop, now 14 months old, is permanently blind in one eye and suffered permanent brain damage, Deputy District Attorney Holly E. Sloma said at Lathrop’s arraignment June 28.
Nathan’s condition is unchanged; he lives with his grandparents.
The father agreed when State Supreme Court Justice Richard C. Kloch Sr. asked him if he had put the child down on the bathroom floor in a such a way that the infant’s head struck the floor.
Sloma cut in, “It has been our position that the defendant did shake the child.” Lathrop conceded that was true, and had confessed as much in a police interview.
Lathrop’s prison term will be followed by three years of post-release supervision, a parole-like regimen in which violations could land him back in prison.
But if Lathrop had been convicted at trial on the original charge of first-degree assault, he faced up to 25 years behind bars. He remains free on $20,000 bail.
Kloch scheduled sentencing for Feb. 7 and warned Lathrop, “You have entered a new area of your life. Prepare yourself for it.”
email: tprohaska@buffnews.com
Lathrop, 26, of Ruhlman Road, Lockport, pleaded guilty to a charge of reckless assault on a child and admitted that he bounced his 3-month-old son’s head off the bathroom floor and shook him.
Nathan Lathrop, now 14 months old, is permanently blind in one eye and suffered permanent brain damage, Deputy District Attorney Holly E. Sloma said at Lathrop’s arraignment June 28.
Nathan’s condition is unchanged; he lives with his grandparents.
The father agreed when State Supreme Court Justice Richard C. Kloch Sr. asked him if he had put the child down on the bathroom floor in a such a way that the infant’s head struck the floor.
Sloma cut in, “It has been our position that the defendant did shake the child.” Lathrop conceded that was true, and had confessed as much in a police interview.
Lathrop’s prison term will be followed by three years of post-release supervision, a parole-like regimen in which violations could land him back in prison.
But if Lathrop had been convicted at trial on the original charge of first-degree assault, he faced up to 25 years behind bars. He remains free on $20,000 bail.
Kloch scheduled sentencing for Feb. 7 and warned Lathrop, “You have entered a new area of your life. Prepare yourself for it.”
email: tprohaska@buffnews.com