NSW: Mother hit child until she stopped crying, court told

AAP General News (Australia)
02-01-2006
NSW: Mother hit child until she stopped crying, court told

ORANGE, NSW, Feb 1 AAP - A woman charged with murdering her nine-month-old baby girl
had once hit the child until she stopped crying, Orange Local Court was today.

A child giving evidence by closed circuit television told magistrate Jan Stevenson
that he had seen Juanita Leslie Schoultz, 24, smack her baby girl Elissa Schoultz-McNabb
a number of times.

"She hit her because she wouldn't stop crying," the boy said in a taped police interview
played at today's committal hearing.

He also said he had seen Schoultz physically assaulting other family members.

Schoultz, of Orange, in the NSW central west, has been in psychiatric care since being
charged last June with murdering Elissa on February 22 last year.

She has not been required to enter a plea.

Under questioning from Schoultz's counsel Winston Terracini, SC, the boy said he'd
seen Elissa's older brother attack her on Christmas Day, 2004, when she touched one of
his toys.

"He threw it at her and it hit her in the head and it knocked her out of her stroller,"

the child said.

The court has been told that a post-mortem examination had shown the baby died from
a fractured skull, along with evidence of other injuries.

Mr Terracini said large sections of the taped police interview with the boy were "hearsay".

The hearing continues.

AAP str/was/cdh/de

KEYWORD: SCHOULTZ

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