MANASSAS, Va. (AP) – The Latest on the trial of a Virginia father charged with killing his 1-year-old son in an effort to collect on more than $500,000 in life insurance (all times local):
1:05 p.m.
A judge has convicted a Virginia father of murdering his 1- year-old son in an effort to collect on more than $500,000 in life insurance he had taken out on the boy.
The ruling means that Joaquin Shadow Rams will be sentenced to life in prison. Prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty in exchange for Rams waiving his right to a jury trial.
Rams maintained his innocence and said the boy, Prince McLeod Rams, died back in 2012 after suffering a fever-induced seizure. A medical examiner initially ruled Prince had been drowned, but Virginia’s chief medical examiner overruled that finding and changed the cause of death to undetermined.
Prosecutors said Prince was either drowned or suffocated and that the kind of seizures Prince suffered are not fatal.
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3:30 a.m.
A judge is set to rule on whether a Virginia father killed his year-old son in an effort to collect on more than $500,000 in life insurance he had taken out on the boy.
The verdict expected Thursday in the murder trial of Joaquin Shadow Rams will cap a legal saga that has drawn out over more than four years.
Prince McLeod Rams died in October 2012 on a court-ordered, unsupervised visit with his father. Rams has maintained his innocence and says Prince died after suffering a fever-induced seizure.
Prosecutors say Prince was either drowned or suffocated and that the kind of seizures Prince suffered aren’t fatal.
Prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty in exchange for Rams waiving his right to a jury trial.
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