State to decide on death penalty in potty-training beating

FARMINGTON, Utah (AP) - Utah prosecutors will soon decide whether to pursue the death penalty against a man accused of beating his girlfriend’s 2-year-old son to death over potty training, a defense attorney said Wednesday.

Joshua Schoenenberger, 35, is accused of stomping his girlfriend’s son to death after he got angry because the child used his diaper instead of the toilet. He has pleaded not guilty to an aggravated murder charge, which carries the possibility of the death penalty.

Davis County prosecutors have until Friday to decide whether they will seek execution in the case, defense lawyer Ed Brass said. That decision will set the tenor and schedule for the rest of the case, he said. Schoenenberger is due back in court June 27.

Schoenenberger’s girlfriend, Jasmine Bridgeman, has pleaded guilty to lying to investigators and is serving at least a year in prison and up to 15 years. A parole board will decide her eventual release date.

The child’s relatives have said they begged Bridgeman to leave the boy with family members when she moved to Utah, but she refused.

The couple were arrested in May 2015 after they brought 2-year-old James Siger Jr. to a hospital in Layton. When they arrived, the boy had stopped breathing and was badly bruised, according to jail documents. Doctors got him breathing again, but he later died of internal injuries to his abdomen.

Schoenenberger is accused of causing those injuries by stomping on his stomach. Police said he was angry because the child had previously spread feces throughout his house.

If convicted, he could face capital punishment under Shelby’s Law, a 2007 statute that made child-abuse deaths into potential death penalty cases even if the defendant didn’t intend to kill the child.

Police said the couple gave different stories about how the boy got hurt, saying he was left alone in the bathtub and found face-down in the water before acknowledging the beating.

Schoenenberger was investigated for child abuse in 2010, when he was accused of pulling a neighbor boy off a bicycle, choking him and burning him with a cigarette during a water balloon fight between some kids, police said.

Schoenenberger pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of misdemeanor reckless endangerment in that case, court records show. He also has a history of drug possession charges.