Murdered 3-year-old Brooklyn boy was drowned and beaten, autopsy finds

Wednesday, March 20, 2024
CROWN HEIGHTS, Brooklyn (WABC) -- The autopsy of a 3-year-old Brooklyn boy found that he was drowned and beaten.

The Medical Examiner reported that 3-year-old Denim Brown's cause of death was drowning, with blunt-force head injuries as a contributing factor.
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Little Denim was left by his mother with a 54-year-old neighbor in their Crown Heights apartment building on Sunday.

That man's stepson, Kevin James, 29, allegedly took the boy to an abandoned apartment in the same building.

Denim was later found floating face down in the bathtub in that apartment, after being tracked using the signal from his tablet.

He had drowned and also suffered head injuries, the autopsy revealed.
After a search, James was located and charged with Denim's murder.



James was held without bail at his arraignment Tuesday night.

He's charged with murder, assault, and acting in a manner injurious to a child.

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He has prior arrests for petty larceny and possession of a knife over four inches.

A makeshift memorial has been set up for Denim in the apartment building's lobby.

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