The Misery Machine - The Case of Jabraylon Bables

Starting point is 00:00:00 Gibralon Quintes Babels was born on July 3rd, 2009 to parents Byron Babels and Jasmine Thompson of Dallas, Texas. Jasmine was originally from Arkansas and was about 19 when Gibralon was born, well, Byron was about 37. Gibralin already had an older brother who was about a year and a half older than him, as well as many extended family members. Everyone called Gibralon Bam Bam or Bamster, and he was known for being bright and talkative. Gibralon was an adorable little boy with black hair, dark brown eyes, and a big smile. Fortunately, little Gibralon was born into a complicated family life. His father, Byron, went to prison for felony forgery shortly after Gibralon was born. While Byron was in jail, Gibralon's mother, Jasmine, wasted no time finding a new boyfriend.

Starting point is 00:00:52 She started dating a new boyfriend named Carnellus Delaney Simmons, age 37. Carnellus was a man with a violent pass, having already been convicted of homicide in 1994. He had killed another man during a fight outside of a South Dallas bar and was sentenced to 15 years in prison for the homicide as well as drug charges. He was released in late 2007, but it didn't take long for him to get into trouble again. Two years after leaving jail, Carnellus was arrested by the Dallas police on even more drug charges after he told them he was selling vials of PCP for $15 each. After serving his jail time, Jabralon's father, Byron, was released from prison on parole in September

Starting point is 00:01:34 of 2010. He spent as much time as he could with his one-year-old son after his release, but Jabralon and his older brother lived with Jasmine and her new boyfriend, Carnellus. Carnellus's apartment was a known drug house, but that didn't seem to deter Jasmine from bringing her two young children into his vicinity. By November of 2010, she was living with Carnalis in a new apartment in the same complex at 8110 Skilman Street in the Lake Highlands neighborhood of Dallas. Jasmine knew that Carnalis was a convicted murderer, but she brushed that off. She never pressed him for details about his homicide conviction and said, that was way before he knew me. Jasmine definitely knew that Carnalys was a drug dealer, but didn't seem to think that made him a danger to her two sons.

Starting point is 00:02:20 She frequently left the boys with Carnalus while she went to work. He said he treated the boys like they were his own and that she didn't have money to hire somebody else to babysit them. On November 4th, 2010, when Gibralon was 16 months old and his brother was nearly three years old, their mother went to the hospital to seek treatment for a UTI. She left Carnalus in charge of babysitting the two boys. At 1149 p.m. that evening, Carnellis called 911 to report that Gibralon had been burned while he was cooking in the kitchen. In the 911 call, Carnellus says that he was heating up water on the stove and didn't realize that his baby son Gibralon was behind him. Carnalus said that when he turned around, all the water spilled on him.

Starting point is 00:03:04 He said, the water so hot it hit him and all his skin is coming off. Sometime during the 911 call, Jasmine returned home. With the help of friends, she tried to administer care for Gibralon while Carnellus relayed instructions from the 911 operator. Paramedics with Dallas Fire Rescue arrived and rushed Gibralon to Parkland Memorial Hospital, where it was found that he had third-degree burns on about 30% of his body. There were burns on both of his legs and butt, as well as on his right hand and wrist. He also had bruises on the left side of his face. Dallas police were called to investigate.

Starting point is 00:03:41 Officer Alyssa Wattis, Officer Ronald Carroll, and Officer R. Fink arrived at the hospital at 12.10 a.m. and found Jasmine in the emergency room with the Gibralon. While there in the hospital, Carnelis told responding officers that he was standing in the kitchen holding a pot of boiling water when Jabralon came running up to him. He told the officers that he dropped the hot water on the floor and heard the boy begin to scream. He said that he picked up the child and put him on a bed.

Starting point is 00:04:07 When he realized that the toddler's skin was falling off, he called 911 for help. Jasmine told the officers that she wasn't home at the time of the injuries, but that Carnellis had called her to say that Jabranius Carylon had been burned. She stated to the officers that when she left home herself that evening, Gibralon was uninjured. Cornelis confirmed that the only other person in the apartment during the incident was

Starting point is 00:04:28 Jabralon's older brother. Doctors in the burn unit explained the extent of Jabrelaan's injuries to the investigating officers, which were at least second-degree partial thickness burns on his legs and second-degree burns on his hand. The police and the doctors agreed that the burn injuries did not seem consistent with Carnellis' story that he had simply splashed Gibralon with water from a drop pot. Jasmine and Carnelis signed consent forms for the police to search their apartment, and then Carnelis was transported to Dallas Police headquarters to be interviewed further by detectives.

Starting point is 00:04:59 According to Jasmine, Carnalis often cook food for the family. When she got the call that Jabralin had been burned, she arrived home from the hospital to find that everything was laid out in the kitchen as if Carnellus was preparing a meal. police photographed the scene the next morning which showed a box of hamburger helper sitting out as well as a package of pork chop sitting on the top of the refrigerator. Other photographs of the kitchen showed a towel on the floor near the stove, as well as a large pot on the stove containing a small amount of water. In addition to the hamburger helper, police found a lot of other interesting items of evidence

Starting point is 00:05:33 in the apartment. In a cabinet over the stove, officers found eight plastic baggies of coke in a clear plastic bowl. In the refrigerator, they also found 95 brown vials containing liquid PCP. In addition to the illegal drugs, officers also seized 27 bottles of assorted flavored vodka, 16 bottles of other vodka, 17 cigarette lighters, three condoms, four empty cigar boxes, 43 cigars, a box of cut up cigarettes, and a small amount of cash that was found in the cabinets. Carnalus also had over $1,000 in his pants. pocket, which the police placed in a secure property room, along with the other items removed from the apartment. After speaking to Carnelis, the Dallas Police CA unit arrested him the

Starting point is 00:06:21 following morning on November 5th. He was arrested on the charge of injury to a child, a first-degree felony charge. The case was being investigated by Dallas police detectives as well as child protective services. Carnalus was held at the Dallas County Jail with bail pending. DeBrelawn's older brother was not injured in the incident and was eventually placed in the care of his grandmother. Meanwhile, Lil Jabralon remained in the Parkland Hospital burn unit. His condition was not initially released to the public, but we can assume from the extent of his horrific burn injuries that he was likely in critical condition. Jasmine was not considered a suspect in the case as she was not home at the time of the incident. She said that Carnells told her that a pot of scalding water had accidentally fallen over onto Gibralon.

Starting point is 00:07:03 When interviewed, she said, the police told me that it looked like he was dipped in water. The doctors told me the same. I'm still searching for the truth. Why she hesitated to believe the police and expert pediatric doctors who were in agreement about Gibralon's injuries and instead gave the benefit of the doubt to the boyfriend who was a convicted murderer and a known drug dealer, we will probably never know. Little Gibralon spent five agonizing weeks in the hospital, hooked up to a battery of tubes in a breathing machine.

Starting point is 00:07:34 In pictures, his body looked lost under the wires, monitors, and tubes. crisscrossing his body, placed there in an effort to keep the little boy alive. Doctors tried everything they could to keep the toddler from succumbing to his horrific injuries. During one surgery, doctors had to remove about 60% of his intestines because they were so badly damaged. They removed even more during a second surgery. Gibralon's tiny body was continuously wracked with infections during his harrowing hospital stay.

Starting point is 00:08:07 He eventually suffered kidney failure. and his body swallowed up so much that he was unrecognizable as cute little bam-bam. Tragically, despite the doctor's best efforts, at 8.53 p.m. on Saturday, December 11th, Gibralon passed away at the Children's Medical Center, Dallas. The injuries and infections that he endured were simply too much to overcome. He had suffered 36 days in the hospital since the burn incident before his little body finally gave out. Some trauma is just too much for the human body to bear, especially when, like, Gibralon, someone is hardly older than a baby. A one-year-old boy died this weekend.

Starting point is 00:08:48 Police say he was held in boiling water more than a month ago. The man accused in the baby's death is his mother's boyfriend, a man with a checkered past. Tonight, in an exclusive interview, Gibralin Babel's mother speaks to News 8 and the Dallas Morning News. Here's Rebecca Lopez. For more than five weeks, one-year-old DeBreelan Babel's Bable's back. for his life. Such a small baby like that, having to go through anything like that. His legs and hands burned so severely that his little body couldn't fight off the infections.

Starting point is 00:09:18 Babels died this weekend. His mother's boyfriend is accused of causing his death. I wish it was me laying in his spot. His mother says she's still searching for answers. Her boyfriend, Cornelius Simmons, was babysitting the child when he claims he burned him accidentally. Cornelius, he called me and he told me that the baby was burned. that he had accidentally burned the baby a pot of water fell over on him. But police say it was no accident. They say the one-year-old was dipped and held in boiling water.

Starting point is 00:09:46 Simmons has a violent past. He was convicted of killing a man in a bar fight in 1994. He got a 15-year prison sentence for the crime. I walked out that day thinking that I was going to come home to him and I didn't. Leaving to Brayland with Simmons is a decision Jasmine Thompson says she'll regret forever. I came home to a burnt baby. The baby's father says he's still trying to understand how someone could hurt his son. I see a beautiful angel. I see a baby that could never be hurt by anybody. It's hard for me to bleed in my heart that anybody would hurt my child.

Starting point is 00:10:21 Beautiful and nice and just happy. Police have arrested Simmons and planned to charge him with the murder of this innocent child. Unsurprisingly, the Dallas County Medical Examiner ruled Gibralon's death a homicide. According to the police, the burns on Gibralon's feet, legs, button, hands were not consistent with the story that Carnellus had told them. It looked as if the little boy had been dipped into the pot of boiling water and held there, rather than the accidental spill that Carnell's claimed had happened. Dallas Police Sergeant Brendan Nichols, supervisor of the CA unit, said, it's a horrible case. It's heartbreaking for everybody involved.

Starting point is 00:11:02 Carnalis, meanwhile, was still in jail for the pending injury to a child charge and was also being held on two felony drug delivery charges. His bail totaled $80,000. Gibralon's mother gave a phone interview the following Monday from the funeral home where she was making arrangements to bury her son. During the interview, Jasmine still sounded supportive of Carnellis, calling him a good person. She said, it would hurt me so much if it was intentional because I gave my trust to this man. Like I said, God hasn't put anything in my heart to say, jazz, he did it on purpose. However, other family members were less naive. De Braylon's aunt, Veronica, said in an interview, from the injuries on the baby, I think he did it intentionally. I feel like he tortured him.

Starting point is 00:11:49 Braylon's father, Byron, said, it hurts for me to believe in my heart that anybody would hurt my child. Right now, I just want to bury my son and find out what happened. At his trial, Carnalus pled guilty to his drug charges, but not guilty to the charge of injury to a child. However, on May 4th, 2012, a jury found Carnalus guilty for the first-degree felony charge of injury to a child with significant bodily injury. He was given the maximum sentence of 99 years in prison, plus five years for each of his two pending drug charges. It's unclear why his child charges weren't upgraded to homicide, which is what the medical examiner had determined to be the manner of death for Gibralon. The prosecution may have simply decided it would be too

Starting point is 00:12:34 difficult to prove that Carnellus intentionally killed Gibralon, while getting a conviction for injury to a child would be a more definite outcome that still carried a heavy sentence. The following year in June of 2013, Carnellis filed an appeal contesting his sentence. From the Court of Appeals' opinion documents, we finally get a full page. picture of Gibralon's injuries. He was admitted to the hospital, Gibralon had burns on his legs all the way up to his waist with more serious burns below the knee. He had burns on the back of both thighs around his groin, on his right butt, the bottom of both his feet, and on his right hand. He also had a small burn around part of his waist. He had no burns on his head,

Starting point is 00:13:16 face, or shoulders, but there were bruises on his left cheek and around his left ear. Disturbingly, it appeared as if the burns were already hours old by the time Jabrelaan arrived at the hospital. Its last detail suddenly puts into perspective the fact that Cornelis had called 911 at 1149 p.m. Nearly midnight. It's not exactly a time when you would expect someone to be making hamburger helper and pork chops to feed a couple of toddlers. Three doctors who treated Gibralon in the hospital testified for the state. Two of these doctors were board certified in CA pediatric medicine. All three doctors testified that the nature of the burns indicated that Jabralon had been immersed in a hot liquid and that the burns were not accidental. In the doctor's opinion, it looked as if

Starting point is 00:14:02 Gibralon had been immersed in the hot liquid while wearing a diaper, which leaked a little, causing the burns on his right butt. In a heartbreaking detail, the doctors also agreed that from the burn patterns, it appeared as if the little boy had folded himself into a fetal position to try to protect himself from the scalding liquid. The medical examiner who ultimately performed the autopsy on Gibralon agreed with the three doctors' assessment of the toddler's injuries. However, a pediatrician who testified for the defense after reviewing case documents said the burns appeared to be accidental and were caused by splattering water. In the appeal, Carnalis's defense argued that since there was evidence that he was making a meal in his attempts to help the child

Starting point is 00:14:43 after the boiling water incident, no rational jury could have found that he intentionally heard Gibralon. They also argued that Carnellis simply acted on an involuntary physical reflex when he was startled by the little boy coming up behind him in the kitchen. The appeal decision pointed out

Starting point is 00:14:58 that at no time during Carnalas's 911 call did he explain how the boiling water ended up in contact with Gibralon. Rather, in the call he simply said that he was boiling water, he did not see the child behind him, and somehow the child was burned so badly that his skin started peeling off.

Starting point is 00:15:14 The appeals court obviously didn't find Carnal's story any more credible than the original jury did because they affirmed the trial court decision and denied the appeal. Cornelis is currently imprisoned with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice and the Jim Ferguson unit in Midway, Texas. Arnellis will be eligible for parole in 2040. A wake for Gibralon Babels was scheduled at 6 p.m. on Thursday, December 16th, at Golden Gate Funeral Home with his funeral the next day. We were unable to find any other information on any other memorials or vigils held to remember the little boy.

Starting point is 00:15:49 Gibralon was buried with a simple granite headstone, which reads, Jabralon Quintes Babels, July 3rd, 2009 to December 11th, 2010. There are no tears in heaven. Running along the bottom is an etching of a train with a teddy bear. Earlier this year, Gibralon's family visited his grave to celebrate what would have been his 15th birthday. They cleaned his gravestone and decorated it with flowers and balloons to remember their bam-bam. Little Gibralin was callously killed by being immersed in boiling water before he was even a year and a half old. Because he was so little when he died, we don't know much about what his personality was going to be like if he'd been allowed to grow out of his toddler years.

Starting point is 00:16:35 He hadn't even reached his terrible twos before his life was cut short in such an agonizing way. He never had a first day of a kindergarten, never lost his first tooth, never got to ride the school bus. So many milestones and experiences were denied to this little boy for no reason. Let us hope that by telling his story, Gibralon's memory can live on for many, many more years to come.

The Misery Machine - The Case of Jabraylon Bables

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