Charging statement points finger at Darnell Gray’s caregiver in his death

Cole County Prosecutor Mark Richardson charges 26-year-old Quatavia Givens with one felony count of child abuse resulting in death.  The Jefferson City Police Department’s probable cause statement says an autopsy was performed on four-year-old Darnell Gray. The autopsy indicated “multiple injuries caused by blunt force trauma and sharp force trauma to multiple locations of the body inflicted prior to death.” Givens allegedly told officers ‘I may have hit him wrong’.

Gray’s body was found Tuesday in the 2100 block of Louis Circle, in some woods. That’s not far from Lewis and Clark Middle School. Investigators aren’t ruling out that others may be involved.