WPBN: On the same day that the jury watched fresh footage of the events leading up to the 6-year-old girl’s death, a New Jersey school bus aide accused of being on her phone during the entire incident took the stand in her own defense.
The courtroom video Her father had to leave the courtroom as jurors witnessed tiny Fajr Williams gasp for air on Thursday, which was extremely upsetting for the victim’s family.
On July 17, 2023, in Franklin Township, the special needs girl was strangled by the body harness that was fastened around her neck. Fajr’s 14-year-old sister got her on the bus that morning, marking the beginning of the third week of summer programming.
According to prosecutors, Fajr slumped in her wheelchair as the bus traveled over a series of bumps on the road. This caused the four-point harness that held her to the chair to tighten around her neck, which stopped her from breathing.
The video showed Amanda Davila, the bus assistant, sitting in the seat in front of Fajr for almost the whole thirty-minute ride to school with her head down and headphones in.
When the bus finally pulled up, Fajr was not responding. CPR was administered by the officers who answered the 911 call. After being sent to the intensive care unit of a nearby hospital, she was declared dead.
“I made a mistake but you guys are trying to put me away for 10 to 20 years, on a mistake,” Davila stated during her testimony.
Although she claimed that there was no shoulder strap for the wheelchair and that one of the four hooks had not been functioning since the first day of Fajr’s bus ride, Davila was seen on the video fastening the wheelchair to the bus’s floor.
“The bus I was on didn’t have it,” she stated.
The strap didn’t fit, she later claimed, changing her narrative. During her lawyer’s questioning, Davila claimed she was “never trained to properly put the wheelchair in and strap it.”
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Prosecutors, however, presented proof of monthly training sessions. Records also revealed that, in violation of the bus company’s regulation, Davila sent 34 texts and used Apple Music and Instagram when she was supposed to be keeping an eye on the three special needs kids in the back of the bus.
Davila explained that she didn’t know why she wasn’t sitting at the back, adding that she “wasn’t thinking.”
Davila’s attorney described the incident as a terrible tragedy and said that his client shared accountability with Fajr’s mother and sister, who he said ought to have ensured the small child was securely fastened.
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“She had one job. She didn’t do it and because she didn’t do it Fajr Williams is dead,” stated Michael McLaughlin, the assistant prosecutor for Somerset County.
Aggravated manslaughter and endangering the welfare of a child are the charges against Davila. In the late afternoon of Thursday, the case was sent to the jury.
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