A 20-year-old man was charged Friday in connection with the death of a 5-year-old boy whose body was found in or near a trash bin in Panorama City.
Brycson Malik Gaddis is set to be arraigned Aug. 18 in a Van Nuys courtroom on one count each of murder and assault on a child causing death.
He was ordered to remain jailed in lieu of $2 million bail.
Gaddis was arrested Wednesday by officers from the Los Angeles Police Department’s Hollywood Station and was being held in lieu of $2 million bail, according to police and sheriff’s jail records.
A second person, who has not been identified, was arrested on unrelated charges, police said.
The arrests followed the detention of five people for questioning after the child’s body was found about 7 a.m. Saturday in a parking lot in the 8200 block of Van Nuys Boulevard, just south of Roscoe Boulevard. Police identified the boy Wednesday as Elyjiah Hearn.
Authorities have not said how Gaddis or the others may be related to the boy. Police said Gaddis is not the boy’s biological father.
Troy Hearn Sr., identified by the Los Angeles Times as the boy’s grandfather, told the newspaper that Gaddis is the ex-boyfriend of the child’s mother. Hearn said the boy’s mother was among the five people questioned by police, but she was ultimately released. Hearn said Gaddis had been stalking the boy’s mother, and he kidnapped the boy and his mother and forced them into an apartment complex near the location where the boy’s body was ultimately found.
“It’s very heartbreaking for him to do that to my 5-year-old grandson,” Hearn told The Times. “I’m identifying the body this afternoon. I’m overwhelmed and so angry that I can’t even explain it. This guy is a bad guy and it’s lucky that the police has him.”
A law enforcement source told the newspaper that the boy suffered “massive injuries,” including a broken jaw, fractured ribs and a lacerated liver. An official cause of the boy’s death has not been released.
Detectives with the LAPD’s Abused Child Unit were leading the investigation.
Police said a tip from the public led them Tuesday to a “large Panorama City apartment complex in the 14500 block of Lanark (Street).”
“Around 9:30 p.m., a search warrant was served at one unit — two adults (one male, one female) were detained, and two children were at the unit.”
A vigil for the young victim was taking place as police arrived at the apartment complex, less than a half-mile from where the boy’s body was found.
Then at around 1 a.m., while detectives were still collecting evidence at a second unit, LAPD personnel detained two more men and a woman near Sunset Boulevard and Ivar Avenue in Hollywood, police said.
All five adults were taken in for questioning, and the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services took custody of the two children, police said.