SPOKANE COUNTY, Wash. — The man who beat his ex-girlfriend’s two-year-old daughter appeared in Spokane Federal Court Thursday afternoon.
U.S. Marshals arrested Chase Michell near Agassiz, British Columbia Canada in September 2016. Michell arrived back in Spokane Wednesday night after a Canadian judge ordered him to be extradited back to the U.S. in 2016.
Michell appeared on Washington’s Most Wanted list after he fled the country in 2015 while police investigated allegations that he beat his girlfriend’s two-and-a-half-year-old daughter while she was away for work.
On July 21, 2015, officers with the Kalispel Tribal Police Department responded to a report of possible child abuse that allegedly took place at the Copper Landing Apartments in Airway Heights. The victim’s grandmother made the call when she found her granddaughter lying in bed with a bloody nose and bruising on her head, according to court documents.
Court documents said after several attempts at keeping the victim awake, the victim’s grandmother confronted Michell, who was placed in charge of the victim while the mother, Michell’s girlfriend at the time, was away. The victim’s grandmother said Michell was lying face-down in bed and that she knew he was “highly intoxicated,” according to court documents.
According to court documents, the grandmother said she asked Michell what happened to the victim, to which he said he didn’t know. The victim’s aunt then showed up at the apartment and asked Michell the same question. Michell responded by saying the victim sustained the injuries playing with the neighbor kids, court documents said. The neighbors denied Michell’s claim.
The victim’s aunt and grandmother took the victim to Sacred Heart Medical Center after she continued to vomit and go in and out of consciousness, according to court documents. The two adults received a call at the hospital from the victim’s neighbors saying Michell took off in the victim’s mother’s car, court documents said.
The next day at Sacred Heart, the victim’s biological father told police the victim told him, “Chase hit me, Daddy. Owie,” according to court documents. The emergency room physician who initially treated the victim ruled the injuries as “non-accidental.”
Court documents said the charge nurse who treated the victim in the Children’s Pediatric Intensive Care Unit confirmed the victim sustained multiple skull fractures in the front and back of her head in a ‘Y’ shape, according to court documents.
Police issued a warrant for Michell’s arrest in July 2015 on charges of Assault on a Child Under the Age of 16 Resulting in Substantial Bodily Injury. Michell’s next court appearance is Aug. 22.