A man who spent the day drinking with a woman he met at a pool in Daytona Beach, Florida, was arrested on suspicion of dangling the woman’s 4-year-old son from a second-floor balcony and dropping him headfirst, police said.
Brandon Gilmore, 31, met the boy’s mother, who has not been identified, by the pool at Sandlewood Beach Resort on Saturday and spent the day drinking with her before taking her son outside her room and “scaring him a little bit,” police said. WESH-TV News reported..
“He was just swinging and playing with them,” witness Dasani Bentley told the outlet.
“And then he let go and grabbed one of his legs and the kids slid off of him and he fell directly on his head on the concrete, where there’s no grass.”
Bentley said Gilmore and the boy’s mother had met at the hotel pool just five hours earlier and ran downstairs after the boy fell to the ground.
“His face was very swollen,” she said of the injured boy. “He was obviously not getting oxygen. It was not a good situation.”
The child was rushed to Halifax Health Medical Centre. Daytona Beach News Journal Said.
“The child has been released from hospital in good health and is not expected to suffer any long-term health issues as a result of this tragic incident,” police said. He told Fox News Digital on tuesday.
Police said surveillance video showed Gilmore picking up the boy in his arms, grabbing him by one of his legs and lifting him onto the balcony before the boy fell to the ground.
Gilmore has been charged with aggravated child abuse and remained in Volusia County Jail without bail as of Tuesday morning.
