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SALT LAKE CITY — A Midvale man has pleaded guilty to killing his infant son.
Zachary Joe Sandoval, 20, took a plea deal last week in 3rd District Court. He was originally charged with murder, a first-degree felony, and three counts of child abuse, a second-degree felony, but pleaded guilty to child abuse homicide, a second-degree felony, and one count of child abuse, a second-degree felony.
He is scheduled to be sentenced July 19.
On Nov. 1, Sandoval and the boy's mother rushed their unresponsive son to a local hospital. Doctors were unable to revive him.
Sandoval was 18 at the time and the boy's mother was 16. Family members told police that the couple had had a "hard time" adjusting to parenthood and they were "frustrated with the child," according to charging documents.
An autopsy conducted found evidence "indicating possible attempted strangulation or suffocation of the baby," as well as "suspicious bruises under his chin, on his flank, on his chest, under his clavicle, and two sets of suspicious bruises with associated bleeding under the scalp on the back of his head, as though he had been impacted with a patterned object or surface," the charges state.
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Midvale man accused of murder, child abuse in infant son's death
A Midvale man has been charged with murder and child abuse in connection with the death of his infant child.The autopsy also concluded "the majority of the injuries occurred on Nov. 1, 2016. (A doctor) determined the cause of death to be blunt force injuries to the head with associated trauma to the torso, all consistent with non-accidental trauma," the charges state.
After he was arrested in 2016, police searched Sandavol's cellphone and found a video of him and the boy's mother having sex. He was charged with sexual exploitation of a minor, a second-degree felony. As part of the plea deal in the murder case, the sexual exploitation charge was dismissed last week.
At the same time, two charges of aggravated assault were also dismissed last week. Those charges stemmed from an incident three months prior to the death of Sandoval's son in which police say he pointed a rifle at a plumber and a property manager.
