West Des Moines police have charged a man with first-degree murder after a predawn call to a home where they found a three-year-old boy dead. Sergeant Jim Barrett says 37-year-old Christopher Martin phoned 9-1-1 about four in the morning to report his son was “unresponsive.”Officers and medics performed C-P-R and took the child to a hospital where he was pronounced dead. An autopsy’s being performed today. In a tragic coincidence, the sergeant confirms the same house in a middle-class suburban neighborhood was the scene of a gruesome crime several years ago.On April 4, 1999 there was a double murder and suicide there. The current family may be the first residents of the home since then. Sergeant Barrett says the house was vacant and up for sale for a long time after the murder-suicide.
Iowa's Radio News Network
