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After more than 17 hours of deliberation, a jury on Wednesday acquitted a College Station woman of charges that she caused brain injuries to a 14-month-old in her unlicensed day care.
Dana Rene Munyon hugged her lawyer and cried after the foreman of the five-man, seven-woman jury read the verdict. More than a dozen of her friends and family members who stayed with her through all of the deliberations cheered and cried.
"Thank God," some exclaimed.
The decision came after a long, tense day.
Lawyers on both sides presented their closing arguments around 3 p.m. Tuesday, and the jurors deliberated until they were sent home around 9:30 p.m.
They returned in the morning, and sent a note to District Judge Travis Bryan III at 11 a.m. saying that they were deadlocked by a seven-to-five vote. The note didn't say which way they were leaning.
At 3 p.m., they sent another note saying the vote had shifted to 10 to 2. That margin changed to 11 to 1 at around 6 p.m.
They returned their verdict just before 7:30 p.m.
Munyon would have faced up to 99 years in prison if she was found guilty.
She operated an unlicensed day care center out of her home for years before her arrest. On April 3, 2008, Alexis Verzal was rushed to the hospital from her home with bleeding in her brain. More than a year later, she can't walk, use one of her arms or speak.
Multiple doctors who treated the child testified that Alexis suffered from head trauma that they believed was caused minutes before Munyon called 911.
Prosecutors Shane Phelps and Kara Comte made no attempt to prove what happened inside the house, but suggested that Munyon had to be the cause of the injuries because she was the only adult there.
Munyon testified that the child collapsed while being placed on a blanket on the floor.
Her lawyer, Craig Greaves, called a doctor who testified that growth charts indicated that Alexis' head grew at an unusually rapid rate in the months before she collapsed and may have been a sign that she had a pre-existing condition.
The doctor, who prosecutors said was paid by the defense and wasn't credible, also said that images taken of Alexis' brain indicated bleeding had occurred well before she collapsed.
"This jury did the right thing," Greaves said. "It is a tragedy all around, for the child and for Ms. Munyon."
Greaves, who was friends with Munyon and had worked with her since the day Alexis was rushed to the hospital, seemed overcome with emotion after the verdict. When asked what the most important factor was in the verdict, he replied: "The Lord."
Alexis' parents and about a dozen of their friends left the courtroom quietly, clearly disappointed with the verdict.
The child played upstairs in the Brazos County District Attorney's Office during the eight days of testimony and two days of deliberations. Her only appearance in the courtroom came when the verdict was read.
Her father, Brandon Verzal, expressed dismay with the jury's decision.
"For 14 months she was a perfectly healthy child, and then instantaneously she had brain damage at [Munyon's] home," he said. "There is going to be a higher judge of Rene Munyon. She is going to have to live with what she did and knowing that she got away with it."
