A mother pleaded guilty to second-degree murder after her five-year-old son died weighing just 19 pounds.
Elijah Lewis, five, was found buried in a Massachusetts park, weighing a mere 19 pounds after enduring severe beatings, starvation, and neglect in 2021. His mother Danielle Dauphinais, 38, from New Hampshire, faces a sentence of 58 years to life in prison.
Dauphinais had pleaded not guilty and was scheduled for trial but later decided to change her plea. She also admitted guilt to two counts of witness tampering related to her son’s death as part of an agreement with prosecutors.
Judge Lisa English in Nashua accepted Dauphinais’ guilty pleas. Her attorney stated that while Dauphinais did not agree with all the facts presented by the prosecution, she admitted her involvement in Elijah’s death.
Elijah was reported missing and subsequently found dead in October 2021 in Ames Nowell State Park in Abington, Massachusetts. An autopsy revealed he had suffered facial and scalp injuries, acute fentanyl intoxication, malnourishment and pressure ulcers.
Prosecutor Bethany Durand said a doctor would have testified at trial that Elijah endured “torture, repeated physical assaults, ongoing psychological maltreatment, including emotional rejection, denigration, isolation, and denial of care,”.
Dauphinais’ boyfriend, Joseph Stapf, pleaded guilty to manslaughter, second-degree assault, falsifying physical evidence, and witness tampering in 2022 in connection with the boy’s death. He was sentenced to 22 to 45 years in prison.
Durand read a series of texts from Dauphinais to Stapf in court that expressed hostility toward Elijah. “He said he wants food and he wants me to stop starving him because it’s not nice,” one said. Another one read, “I’m gonna kill him and I mean it,” and another said, “I hit him with the shower rod that’s all I did.”
Elijah’s father, who lives in Arizona, had brought him to live with Dauphinais, Stapf, and their two-year-old daughter in May 2020. By that fall, the father had filed a complaint with the state Division for Children, Youth and Families, concerned that Elijah wasn’t getting proper medical care, Durand said.
Danielle Dauphinais faces a sentence of 58 years to life in prison
A visit to the doctor that November showed the child weighed 32 pounds (14.5 kilograms) and had bruises on his face, eye, and arm. Dauphinais later told the agency that her son was sent to California to live with Dauphinais’ sister, a custody arrangement the father had agreed to, but Dauphinais didn’t follow through, Durand said.
In October 2021, Dauphinais gave birth to a boy at home. Stapf took the newborn to a hospital with plans to abandon him there.
Child services began an investigation but found no trace of Elijah. Dauphinais claimed her son was with her sister, then her brother.
Both later revealed to investigators that Dauphinais had asked them to lie about Elijah’s location. Prosecutors revealed that when Elijah was discovered, he stood 3 feet tall and weighed only 19 pounds, significantly less than the average five-year-old boy who typically stands around 3.6 feet tall and weighs close to 40 pounds.
While Elijah was still missing, Stapf and Dauphinais were apprehended in New York. Elijah’s remains were discovered days after their arrest.
In 2022, Dauphinais was indicted on one count of first-degree murder for intentionally causing her son’s death, one count of second-degree murder for acting recklessly leading to his death, and three counts of witness tampering.