she s the little girl who won the heart of a big city. they called you the miracle baby. why did they call you that? yay shot in the head at point blank range there was a pillow and it had blood on it. as she fought to live, this detective vowed to catch whoever left treated today. soon, he turned up a promising lead. in the hospital she battled back. to know that she had survived was a pretty powerful moment. not just her body but her mind. they come in the daycare and erica said don t let them heard me. investigators found what could be a vital clue but could it be enough to crack the case? hello, welcome to dateline. i m craig melvin. it all started with a crime that not even police could believe. a little girl. just a toddler. shot in the head, deliberately. left for dead by a killer who, then, disappeared. but a detective vowed to crack this case, no matter how long it took. one of the biggest attractions at the louisville zoo was a floppy you
she s the little girl who won the heart of a big city. they called you the miracle baby. why did they call you that? yay shot in the head at point blank range there was a pillow and it had blood on it. as she fought to live, this detective vowed to catch whoever left treated today. soon, he turned up a promising lead. in the hospital she battled back. to know that she had survived was a pretty powerful moment. not just her body but her mind. they come in the daycare and erica said don t let them heard me. investigators found what could be a vital clue but could it be enough to crack the case?
never dwelled on if she wasn t going to make it. now the family had to turn its focus to the one who did not make it. erica s mom, aaron. on may the 25th 2006, a week after she was gunned down, aaron s family gathered for her funeral. and the man who delivered the eulogy was none other than the officer who had raced erica to the hospital. steve kelsey who also served as a minister in a local church. it was so moving and personal because he had been on the scene. but where jessie holiday who had been a crime reporter, what elevated the story was simple, little erica, the public concern from the very beginning was always that there was a two-year-old involved. after nearly two weeks in the hospital, erica was well enough to move to nearby fraser rehabilitation institute. the hard work was just
. both for her family friend. you have a cigarette? can have a cigarette? jake had known erin for years, he called her auntie a. they re menthol. that s the best i could do. that s why smoke, mental. police brought him in to see if he had any information that could help the investigation. one of the very last people to color, talk to her by phone, was you. which is why we want to talk to you. was me? he provided some names for investigators to check out and repeatedly offered to assist police in any way he could. i ll help you to help you find whoever did this. back at children s hospital erica was now in the icu holding on for life. her heart broken grandparents and big sister stood daily vigil. that wasn t erica. ebony took it very hard. 14 years older, she had been like a second mother to erica in fact, erica actually called
that was probably a little bit of emotion spilling over. there was a baby shot and there was an adult that was killed. we were expecting that at that point the baby to die. erica had practically flatlined that are high-speed policed turban delivered to children s hospital she was rushed into the emergency room where doctors and nurses worked frank thickly to stabilizer. her vital signs were barely measurable. dr. , thomas morey ali, a pediatric surgeon performed surgery on the gunshot erica said these were kept sense of her skull and brain, pre off. this is where you can see part of the bullet, and broken bone. the surgeons lifesaving mission was to clean the fragments from america s hand, repair the wounds and preserve bring function if possible. erica actually was lucky in