Juan Maravilla: Sex offender who tortured girlfriend's 15-month-old daughter to death gets 24 years in jail
GREEN BAY, WISCONSIN: A registered sex offender has been sentenced to 24 years in prison after he tortured his girlfriend's 15-month-old daughter to death. Juan Javier Maravilla, 33, was convicted of first-degree reckless homicide and physical abuse of a child. He was sentenced to 24 years in prison and 12 years on supervision on Friday, August 7 in Green Bay in Wisconsin.
The mother was charged with neglecting a child, child abuse-fail/prevent bodily harm and resisting or obstructing an officer. Judge John Zakowski had called the case "torture", WBAY reveals. The incident had taken place in May 2017 after the police were called to a Green Bay hospital.
Both Maravilla and his girlfriend Sarah L Kairys had gone to the hospital along with Kairys' 15-month-old baby girl who was pronounced dead. As per autopsy results, the baby had died of blunt force injuries to the head and the torso. There were several injuries in stages of healing on the child's body, which included bite marks and fractured ribs. A police officer had said in the criminal complaint, "I could see that the child was covered in bruises all over its body, varying size, and color."
The officers then started to question Maravilla and Kairys who had first claimed that the child had fallen down the stairs at the latter's home located in Western Ave town. They also claimed that the death of the baby was an accident. Maravilla said he was unable to live at the home along with Kairys as he is a registered sex offender and it would violate his parole.
Kairys eventually told investigators how she started to notice more bruises on her child. She added how Maravilla had told her that the injuries had been a result of falling down. She spoke to the police and shared how a week before the baby died, she noticed how the bruises had been getting darker and that the toddler was "crying a little more." She also saw the bruises around the baby's eyes "getting darker." She recalled the day the toddler had died and said she had been watching movies on the couch with Maravilla.
He then went upstairs to put the toddler to bed. Kairys said she later found the child lying on the floor at the bottom of the stairs and crying. She told the police that she felt that her boyfriend was responsible for her baby's death. When he was questioned by the authorities, he shared, "I smacked her up because I got mad, I just got mad and accidentally hit her." He later added, "I didn’t mean for this s**t, I didn’t want her [the baby] to go [die]."
An informant spoke to the police and said that they were watching the news on the baby's death and Maravilla had told the CI that a week before the child had died, he had kicked the baby in the head. Lt Rick Belanger from the Green Bay Police Department revealed, "The trauma that led to this little girl's death, it's very disturbing."