Monessen man wanted in assault on 3-year-old boy
MONESSEN – A Monessen man is wanted on charges he caused severe burns to the hands of a 3-year-old boy while the child was in his care in February.
District Judge Joseph Dalfonso signed a warrant Friday for the arrest of Fred Louis Bacon Jr., 23, in connection with the child abuse case that was reported Feb. 24 to a Westmoreland County detective, court records show.
Bacon, who last lived at 945 Leeds Ave., took the boy to Monongahela Valley Hospital about 11:50 a.m. Feb. 9, telling the medical staff he ran the boy’s hands under hot water after he was outside playing and they became cold, the record indicates.
The hospital diagnosed the child as having second-degree burns on both hands and transferred him to UPMC-Mercy hospital in Pittsburgh, the investigator stated in the affidavit supporting the criminal charges in the case.
Bacon told the same story about how the boy’s hands were burned when he was interviewed by a caseworker at Westmoreland County Children’s Bureau.
A physician at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC’s Child Advocacy Center then told the detective Feb. 27 the victim’s injuries could not have happened in the way Bacon had described.
The physician’s report concluded the injuries were “consistent with inflicted burns; there is no scenario in which a child could have burnt his own hands in this distribution pattern (both hands, both sides, clear demarcation),” the affidavit states.
Bacon faces charges of aggravated assault, reckless endangerment and endangering the welfare of children.