Parties involved in the case of Mohammad Ahmad, who is facing a murder charge in the death of a 21-month-old Alexandria boy, had to re-live the events of Tuesday, Sept. 12, from its mundane beginning to its tragic end, at Monday morning's preliminary hearing.
At the end of the hearing, which took place at the county's Juvenile and Domestic Relations courthouse, Judge Gayle Carr certified the case of Ahmad, 24, of Kingstowne, to go before a grand jury to determine whether it will go to trial. Ahmad sat silent throughout the proceedings.
The only witness called was Ahmad's wife of three years, Jillian, 21, who was questioned first by the prosecution and then by the defense.
At the request of Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Kathryn Swart, Jillian Ahmad described the townhouse basement on Silver Ridge Court in which she and her husband live and where she ran a small, unlicensed daycare operation. She noted toys in the yard, two baby swings inside, two couches, an entertainment center, a rug with the ABCs on it.
She looked after five young children at the house, as well as her and her husband's daughter, who turned 19 months old the day of the hearing. On Sept. 12, she said, three of her clients' children were in the house. One was Miles Simon, who died that day, and another was Miles' sister.
Jillian Ahmad said she woke her husband up at about 8:30 a.m. to look after the children while she ran errands. She said the children all seemed fine when she left about 15 minutes later. She bought gas, stopped at a friend's house and then went to Wal-Mart. She was gone for about two hours, she said.
WHILE SHE WAS at Wal-Mart, she recalled, her husband phoned her. "He said, 'Miles is tired. Do you want me to put him to sleep?'" she said. She told him it was too early for the children to nap and that she would be home soon to give them a snack and put them to bed.
When she arrived at home, she said, the house was peaceful. Two of the children were dancing in front of the television, her daughter was walking down the hall and her husband was sitting in front of his laptop in the TV room. "He said, 'I think you'd better check on Miles. He's been asleep for a while,'" she said.
When Jillian Ahmad found Miles lying in the playpen, she knew something was wrong, she said. "His lips were blue, and his eyes were in the back of his head."
Miles was still breathing when she found him, said Jillian Ahmad, weeping. She said she told her husband to call 911, but he told her not to. She called anyway and was told the child might be choking. She followed the directions of the dispatcher, trying to move Miles' tongue. He convulsed and vomited, but his condition did not improve, she said.
Asked how long it took for rescue workers to arrive, she responded, "I don't know. It seemed like forever. I was screaming at them, 'Please, hurry up.'"
By the time they got there, she said, her husband had left. She next saw him at the Fairfax County Adult Detention Center, where he has been held since he was extradited from New York a few days after Miles Simon's death. U.S. marshals had found him in a motel near La Guardia Airport.
An autopsy performed later in the day showed that the child had multiple fractures in his skull, a lacerated liver and surface wounds unspecified in police releases.
DEFENSE ATTORNEY Robert Whitestone asked Jillian Ahmad whether she had been threatened into testifying. "Were you assaulted recently?" he asked.
"Yes," she said. She had a cast on her right hand and a large adhesive bandage on the left side of her neck. However, she maintained that the attack had nothing to do with the case.
In response to questions about whether her husband had ever been aggressive or violent with their daughter or any of the children they cared for, she said he had not.
"Did you feel there was any problem with your husband being around the children while you were gone that morning?" asked Whitestone.
"No," she said. "Absolutely not."
Jillian Ahmad also noted that her husband's plea not to call 911 could have implied that he was concerned about their lack of a child care permit. "He said, 'No, don't call 911. You're going to get into trouble,' or something like that," she said.
Asked if her husband had admitted to harming the child, she said, "He's told me that he has not done anything."
Swart said the case merited a first-degree murder conviction. As she enumerated the child's injuries, Miles' father quietly wept. The damage inflicted on the child, she said, was grounds for a second-degree murder charge. Additionally, "anyone who would do that kind of thing to a child" would have to have thought about it, she said, which would make the charge first-degree.
"They haven't shown the agent who inflicted the injuries," said Whitestone in rebuttal. "They haven't shown when it happened."
Swart noted that Mohammad Ahmad was the only person known to be in the house who could have inflicted the injuries.