SW Philly father charged with murder in infant son's beating death

A Southwest Philadelphia father has been arrested and charged with murder and endangering the welfare of a child in the beating death last week of his infant son, police said Wednesday.

Omar Cooper, 31, is accused of punching his child, Omar Braxton-Cooper, who was 6 weeks old, so severely that the baby suffered internal brain injuries and internal bleeding in his abdominal organs, Homicide Sgt. Bob Kuhlmeier said. The baby also suffered a detached retina, but it was not immediately clear if that was from punching or some other form of abuse, he said.

The injuries were so horrific that one person described the infant's injuries as "worse than a car wreck," said Kuhlmeier, who declined to say who provided that description.

Kuhlmeier said the child's mother was not home on Friday when the beating allegedly occurred in their second-floor apartment on the 5800 block of Willows Avenue. At some point after the mother came home, Cooper allegedly told her the baby was bleeding from his nose, and the two parents brought the infant to Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital in Darby.

The baby's condition was so dire at that point that staff at Mercy Fitzgerald had him flown by medical helicopter to the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, where he was pronounced dead at 12:35 p.m.

CHOP staff, suspecting abuse, called police. After an investigation, police said, Cooper was arrested and charged.

The Medical Examiner's Office said the baby's death was caused by "multiple blunt impact injuries."

Cooper, who is in custody after having been denied bail, faces a June 14 preliminary hearing.