ALBUQUERQUE, NM (KRQE/CNN) – Police said a New Mexico father admitted to beating his 5-year-old daughter to death over homework.
Paramedics with Albuquerque Fire Rescue were called to an apartment complex just before 1 a.m. where they found Sarah Dubois-Gilbeau possibly in cardiac arrest.
Paramedics then called police.
The girl’s father, Brandon Reynolds, told authorities she had heart problems.
“The injuries were not consistent with what they were told,” said Officer Simon Drobik, of the Albuquerque Police Department.
She died shortly after, but officers didn’t buy the 36-year-old Reynolds’ story.
“It appears that this father brutally beat this child,” Drobik said.
APD said Reynolds then admitted he got mad at his daughter when she didn’t want to do her homework late Thursday night.
He told police it “triggered” him and that he beat her with a water shoe up and down her body.
Neighbors said Reynolds was strict and that they knew he would spank the 5-year-old sometimes but never in front of them.
Then Thursday night, neighbors said they did hear commotion coming from Reynolds’ apartment.
“She heard him yelling at her, then she came outside to take a breath and then that’s when she saw the ambulance,” said a neighbor describing what happened.
According to police, Sarah had moved back and forth from New Mexico to California for the last five years.
Reynolds does not appear to have a criminal record in New Mexico.
