June 8, 2008
BY SOPHIA CHANG | sophia.chang@newsday.com; Daniel Edward Rosen contributed

A foster mother accused of abandoning children in Texas was charged yesterday along with her boyfriend in connection with the death of a toddler found in the couple's Brooklyn apartment, police said.

Nymeen Cheatham, 30, who police said was fostering 3-year-old Kyle Smith, was charged with assault and endangering the welfare of a child.

Her boyfriend, Lemar Martin, 25, was charged with assault and endangering a child's welfare, as well as criminal possession of marijuana. The three lived in an apartment on Patchen Avenue in Bedford-Stuyvesant.

An autopsy yesterday found Kyle died from "multiple blunt impact injuries," said Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the city medical examiner. Police said more charges are pending.

The Associated Press reported that police said the boy had horrific signs of abuse, including a broken leg, and apparently had been sodomized before he died.

Cheatham's and Martin's relatives could not be reached yesterday.

Police found Kyle, who was 3-foot-1 and 28 pounds, unconscious when they went to the apartment after receiving a 911 call around 10:30 a.m. Friday. Kyle was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead at 11:40 a.m.

Police declined to comment on why Kyle had been placed in Cheatham's custody. Sheila Stainback, a spokeswoman for the city's Administration for Children's Services, said the agency was investigating and declined to say if it placed the child with Cheatham. Police also declined to comment on Kyle's birth parents.

The Borger, Texas, police department has a warrant out for Cheatham's arrest after a 2002 incident there in which she was charged with abandoning five children in unsanitary conditions without food or water, Sgt. Jerry Langwell of the Borger police department said yesterday.

The case was referred to the local Child Protective Services agency and the district attorney's office, Langwell said.

Langwell could not say who the children were, where the incident happened or the outcome of the case. A message left for the Borger district attorney was not returned yesterday.

Yesterday, candles and a yellow sign that read "Rest In Peace Baby Kyle" sat next to Kyle's building as neighbors described hearing Cheatham yelling at the child.

Cheatham and Martin moved to the apartment about two years ago, and Kyle came about six months later, said building superintendent Gail McNally.

Kyle was happy at first, but "towards the end, he didn't smile or nothing," said McNally, 50. "He had a numb look on him."

On a bitterly cold February day, Hason Parker, 25, saw Kyle sitting on the building's front steps, dressed in a T-shirt and shorts. Cheatham was inside shouting, he said.

"She said, ' ... You're going to stay out there,'" he said. "The kid seemed really afraid, kind of like he didn't know what was going to happen to him next.

"A lot of people [would] be seeing stuff, but at the same time, we haven't reported it, so we feel horrible about that," he said.

In Bedford-Stuyvesant yesterday, a crowd shouted epithets and "Burn in hell" at Cheatham and Martin as detectives led them from the 81st Precinct after their booking.

Daniel Edward Rosen contributed to this story.

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