MADISON, Ind. (WDRB) -- The father says it was a tragic accident, but police are treating the death of a one-month-old boy as a murder.
Christopher Coy's case is on the front page of the local newspaper and the talk of the town in Madison.
"It is insanely frustrating to put murderer and my brother's name in the same sentence," said Coy's sister, Tiffany McCleery. "There's no way that my brother did this intentionally."
Coy walked to court Monday afternoon with a blank stare and in shackles after being arrested in connection with the death of his son, Christopher Edward Coy -- but family members say police got it wrong.
"He just said that it was an accident, that he was carrying the baby in his car seat and he tripped on the stairs and the accident happened," McCleary said.
The child was rushed to the hospital earlier this month after being found unresponsive; he died a few days later.
"The medical examiner's office ruled the cause of death to be blunt force trauma and the manner of death to be homicide," said prosecutor Chad Lewis.
Prosecutors say there was an examination shortly after the child was brought to the hospital and the results don't support Coy's side of the story.
"A CT scan was done at that time and discovered a scull fracture, brain bleeding and hemorrhaging," Lewis said.
Meanwhile, as Coy was escorted back to jail, family members tried to comfort one another with stories of him just a few weeks before this happened.
"You could just tell that he was so excited," McCleery said. His family was together and he was just ... everything was going good."
Coy was ordered held on a $500,000 bond. He was due back in court June 20.
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