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Far Rockaway Mom Gets 17 Years for Fatally Beating 2-Year-Old Daughter: DA

By Ben Fractenberg | February 8, 2017 6:03pm
 Ashley Diaz was sentenced to 17 years in prison Wednesday for fatally beating her 2-year-old daughter in their Far Rockaway home in 2014.
Ashley Diaz was sentenced to 17 years in prison Wednesday for fatally beating her 2-year-old daughter in their Far Rockaway home in 2014.
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QUEENS — A Far Rockaway mother was sentenced to 17 years in prison after pleading guilty to fatally beating her 2-year-old daughter, the Queens District Attorney announced Wednesday.

Ashley Diaz, 31, knocked Kevasia Edwards unconscious inside their Beach 56th Place home on Feb. 3, 2014, the DA said. Diaz called a neighbor after the attack, who then performed CPR on the 2-year-old, but was unable to revive her.

“This is a senseless and tragic case in which the defendant viciously beat an innocent toddler — her own child — to death,” District Attorney Richard Brown said in a statement.

“As evidence by the multiple bruises, abrasions, scarring and lacerations that covered her tiny body, the victim’s short-lived life was one of unthinkable suffering and abuse that ultimately ended in her death. The defendant will now have a lengthy time in prison to reflect on her heinous crime.”

Kevasia was taken to St. John’s Episcopal Hospital where she was pronounced dead at 12:02 a.m. on Feb. 4.

Diaz at first said her daughter suffered a seizure and became unresponsive.

But an autopsy found she suffered multiple fresh and old bruises to her face, neck, torso and legs as well as optical nerve hemorrhages, rib fractures and traumatic liver injuries, prosecutors said.  

The mother pleaded guilty in January to manslaughter charges and was sentenced Wednesday by Judge Richard Buchter in Queens Supreme Court.

She will also be subject to five years of post-release supervision.