Published: April 25, 2008 10:15 am      

Kids covered in bite marks

Child abuse trial of Cesar Mojica brings dental expert

Each of Cesar Mojica’s three young children were covered in human bite marks, a San Antonio forensic dentist testified Thursday during the third day of his child abuse trial.

Dr. David Senn was one of three medical experts to take the stand Thursday, one day after San Marcos Police Detective Adrian Marin testified Mojica admitted to him he’d bitten the children, supposedly a disciplinary technique his mother used on him.

Senn told jurors in the case that Amber, one of Mojica’s twins that was two when seized from the family’s Dripping Springs mobile home in October 2006, had a total of 56 visible injuries, including 31 human bite marks that “literally” covered her “from head to toe, front and back and both sides.” He added that the girl also had two marks suggestive of a bite, but less than conclusively so.

Her twin Cesar Jr. had 57 visible injuries of which 21 of which were bites as well as five suggesting bites.

Their older sister, Angel, who was three and a half when taken by Child Protective Services, had 28 visible injuries including nine bite marks and four “suggestive.”

Senn testified that the children also had contusions (bruises), lacerations (torn skin), linear marks — those that suggest a cord or rope of some type — mouth injuries, burns and scars.

One of only six forensic dentists in Texas, Senn testified he had seen many children and adults who had been bitten by humans but “never to this extent.” Some of those bites were in “private areas” including two near one of the girls’ breasts and others on buttocks, something he said is more commonly seen in cases of sexual assault.

Some were “overlapping bite marks made at different times,” he said.

Mojica is charged with multiple counts of child abuse as is his wife Sarah Amaya, who will be tried later.

Other testimony on Thursday came from Dr. Jill Humphrey, an Austin pediatrician who spoke to the degree of developmental progress the children have made since being removed from their parents’ home and also to the differences between their development and that of their biological sibling Blake, who was born after the mother was jailed.

At the time they were removed from their home, Amber weighed 17 lbs.; Cesar Jr. weighed 22 lbs. and Angel weighed 31 lbs.

At his one year well baby examination performed Dec. 26, 2007, Humphrey testified that Blake Mojica weighed 22 lbs. and 14 ounces. That put him in the 51st percentile according to growth analysis models used in pediatric medicine.

Humphrey testified she examined the three older children again in January of this year, when the twins were four years old.

At that time, she told jurors, Cesar Jr. weighed 27 lbs., which put him at less than the third percentile; during the same examination Amber was found to weigh 26 and a half pounds, also below the third percentile.

“It would indicate they had different nutritional standards during early childhood,” Humphrey told jurors.

She said the children had both stunted growth and delayed development.

Testimony continues Friday in District Judge Jack Robison’s courtroom.