Debate Magazine

Bella Bond: Conceived in a Tent at Occupy Boston and Punched in the Stomach Until She Died

By Eowyn @DrEowyn

Lock these people up, throw away the key, and turn them loose in gen pop. Justice should be served rather quickly.

Bella Bond

Bella Bond

Daily MailBella Bond was punched in the stomach by her mother’s boyfriend until she died, her mother has told investigators, claiming the man thought the two-year-old was ‘possessed by demons’.

Rachelle Bond, 40, of the Boston neighborhood Mattapan made the allegations against 35-year-old Michael McCarthy as she spoke to investigators about the murder case involving her daughter who became known as ‘Baby Doe’ after her body was found in June, an official said.

Rachelle Bond

Rachelle Bond

The tragic girl’s body was placed in ‘some kind’ of refrigerator after she was killed before it was disposed of, two officials briefed on the investigation told the Boston Globe. While the medical examiner has found no signs of internal bleeding or external bruising consistent with blunt force to the victim’s stomach – investigators are working under the theory that McCarthy did something violent to Bella’s stomach that made her unable to breathe. ‘There is confidence that what he did to her stomach area resulted in her loss of life,’ the official said.
Michael McCarthy

Michael McCarthy

A source told Fox 25 that Bond had gone into her daughter’s room and reportedly saw McCarthy punching Bella because he believed she was possessed, before keeping her little body in a refrigerator for around a month until disposing of it. After nearly three months, the washed up toddler who was found dead on the Boston Harbor beach and known simply as Baby Doe was identified on Friday as Bella Neveah Amoroso Bond. Bella was just shy of three years old when her body was found on Deer Island in Winthrop by a woman walking a dog on June 25.

The murder case involving the girl broke open on Wednesday when a tipster in Billerica told police Bond admitted to the caller’s brother that McCarthy ‘killed her child’. The tipster told police McCarthy allegedly killed Bella because he ‘supposedly thought the child had demons in her’, according to the Boston Herald.

The mother from the Boston neighborhood Mattapan and her boyfriend were arrested on Friday in connection with Bella’s death.  McCarthy faces a murder charge while Bond faces a charge of accessory after the fact of murder. They are expected to be arraigned on Monday.

The girl’s father, Joseph Amoroso, told the Boston Herald that Bella was conceived in a tent at Occupy Boston and that he believes Bond has nothing to do with their daughter’s death. ‘She told me the whole story,’ he said. ‘She was very emotional, sincere through the whole thing, and I believe her. I believe her — that it was this man who murdered our daughter, murdered a two-year-old.’

bond father

Amoroso said that he left Bond, his ex-girlfriend, after learning that she had been arrested for prostitution. He has been in Florida and returned to Massachusetts in August, according to WHDH. His mother, Patricia Quinn, said she saw the composite image and thought the sketch looked like Bella but was not sure as she had not seen her granddaughter since 2013.

On Friday, a press conference was held where Speaker Robert DeLeo confirmed that Bella is Baby Doe and that the two arrests have been made. Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel Conley said during a later briefing that information on the cause of death will be released on Monday, adding that her life ended ‘by violence in the place she should have felt safest: in her home’.

‘We have a very good idea of what happened to her based on evidence,’ Conley said on Friday. We have powerful evidence has provided us a manner of death that we will be able to prove in court.’

Conley said a descriptive account of what happened to Bella would be released in a press conference on Monday.  The state medical examiner still has to confirm Bella’s identity through positive DNA testing.  ‘The men and women who investigated this case have given her her name back. Now we will give her justice,’ Massachusetts State Police Col Richard McKeon said.

The archbishop of Boston is among at least 10 people offering to take the remains of little Bella to give her a proper burial.  Prosecutors confirm Cardinal Sean O’Malley was one of the people who offered.

DeLeo said Bond and McCarthy, who are in custody, were blaming each other for Bella’s death. He also added that McCarthy has drug issues. 

Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker said during the conference that Bond had other children who were older, however her parental rights to two of them were terminated between 2001 and 2006. According to court records, Bond was arrested at least three times for prostitution, WCVB reported. She also reportedly struggled with drug addiction.

Earlier on Friday, an official said police searched a Dorchester apartment on Thursday and they have been in contact with family members.  The girl’s 44-year-old aunt told the Boston Herald on Friday afternoon confirmed Baby Doe was her niece. ‘Oh, my God, I can’t believe it,’ Tamera Bond said. ‘I thought the picture looked like Bella, but Bella was a little chubbier.’ Tamera Bond said the last time she saw Bella was nine months ago, in January.

Bella’s grandmother, who did not want to be identified, told WCVB that she didn’t know her granddaughter existed – she hadn’t spoke to her daughter Bond in 14 years.  ‘I think we maybe have to see our priest or something because i don’t know what to do. This is shocking,’ she said. ‘I think it’s our responsibility to do something.’

A tip-off from neighbors brought the nearly three-month long search to determine the girl’s identity to an end on Thursday.  The Boston Herald reported that Siomy Torres, who had lived in the Maxwell Street building on the Dorchester-Mattapan line since June 2014, said state police showed up at her home and started questioning her about her neighbor’s daughter. ‘They told me they were looking for the little girl, and asked me if I’d seen her,’ Torres said.

She said state police showed her the composite picture of Baby Doe and she recognized it. ‘I haven’t seen her in months. I usually hear her because her room is against the backside of my apartment. I usually hear her crying or running around the house and I haven’t heard that,’ Torres said. ‘I used to see her every day. Running around.’

Torres said she had assumed DCF had taken Bella but once Bond’s new boyfriend had come around she stopped seeing the girl and Bond stopped speaking to her.

bond bella2

A DCF spokeswoman said they had contact with Bella twice between August and December 2012 and June and September 2013 on allegations of neglect, WCVB reported. ‘Since June, the Department has been working closely with law enforcement on exploring dozens of leads in hopes to identify the little girl found on Deer Island,’ DCF spokeswoman Rhonda Mann said. ‘Now that we know her name, the story is no less tragic. DCF has not had an open case with this family for over two years, but did have brief involvement with Baby Bella as an infant.  Our thoughts are with Bella’s extended family as the investigation into her death continues.’

Authorities said they were able to match Bella’s identity with the clothes she was found wearing when her body was found on Deer Island in Winthrop on June 25, according to the Daily Beast. She was wrapped in a zebra-print blanket and was wearing black-and-white polka-dot leggings. In photos seen on social media, Bella is wearing a pair of black-and-white polka-dot leggings, but Conley would not confirm if these were the leggings she was found in.  Her body did not have fingerprints when she was found due to erosion by the tide and investigators have not determined a cause of death.

On Facebook, Bond posted several photos of Bella as they cuddled, cooked together and the mother once called Bella ‘My love, my soul, my life. My heart beats because she’s in my world.’ In another post she wrote: ‘Love her to death. I am on top of the world because of her. My life is complete again and worth living. I give her the world and more if I can…’

bond 2

On August 6, 2014, Bond made a post on her daughter’s second birthday saying ‘My lil bell. It’s her b’day today. Happy birthday my sweetest thing ever…’ The last photos Bond shared of Bella on Facebook were on Christmas day last year.

A spokesman for the Suffolk district attorney’s office said the investigation remains ‘very active.’ A state police spokesman did not immediately return calls.

Bella was named Baby Doe by investigators and was estimated to be four years old. Based on photos on social media, however, Bella was just shy of three years old when she died. She was believed to have had brown eyes, brown hair, weighed about 30 pounds and stood at about three-and-a-half-feet tall. Her body was found in June by a woman walking a dog and the discovery sparked a massive social media campaign.

Within two weeks, a composite image of the chubby-cheeked, brown-eyed girl had reached an estimated 60 million people online and a search spanned across at least 36 states.

A tip line also brought in thousands of tips, with investigators ruling out more than 200 girls. Police had originally believed the girl had washed ashore when her body was discovered.

However, in July they announced they believed she was already dead when she was left on the rocks, wrapped in a zebra print blanket, as her body was not waterlogged enough to have been in the ocean for an extended period of time. Authorities had also said that they believed it was likely she lived in the area and that whoever disposed of her body picked the site because of convenience and proximity.

An analysis of pollen samples of items recovered from the trash bag have also led authorities to believe that Baby Doe spent time in several of the New England states, and not solely the Greater Boston area as it was originally believed, according to WCSH 6.

DCG


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