Mother who beat and starved her 5-year-old son to death faces over 50 years in prison

[October 25, 2024]  By KATHY McCORMACK

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — A New Hampshire woman faces a sentence of over 50 years to life in prison in the death of her 5-year-old son, who was beaten, starved and exposed to drugs, weighing just 19 pounds when his body was found buried in a Massachusetts park in 2021.

Danielle Dauphinais, 38, is scheduled to appear in court Friday. She was facing a trial but pleaded guilty last month to second-degree murder and other charges in the death of Elijah Lewis in an agreement reached with prosecutors.

Dauphinais’ boyfriend, Joseph Stapf, pleaded guilty to manslaughter, second-degree assault, falsifying physical evidence and witness tampering in 2022 in connection with the boy’s death. He was sentenced to 22 to 45 years in prison.

Elijah's autopsy showed he suffered facial and scalp injuries, acute fentanyl intoxication, malnourishment and pressure ulcers. Prosecutors read a series of texts between Stapf and Dauphinais that expressed hostility toward Elijah and frustration if he didn’t behave according to their wishes.

“He said he wants food and he wants me to stop starving him because it’s not nice,” one said. Another message read, “I’m gonna kill him and I mean it,” and another said, “I hit him with the shower rod that’s all I did.”

Some of the texts from Stapf to Dauphinais told her to give Elijah more food to “fatten him up.”

Elijah was born in Arizona in 2016 and his parents divorced a year later. Dauphinais moved to New Hampshire. In May 2020, his father Timothy Lewis brought Elijah to live with Dauphinais, Stapf, and the 2-year-old daughter she had with Stapf. They stayed in the basement of a home where Stapf's mother also lived.

However, by that fall, Lewis became concerned that Elijah wasn’t getting proper medical care and contacted the state Division for Children, Youth and Families. In a wrongful death lawsuit filed this past May against Dauphinais, Stapf, Stapf's mother, and the child services agency, Lewis described Elijah as having developmental challenges and a difficult behavior pattern that had worsened in New Hampshire.

Danielle Dauphinais, who was charged with second-degree murder and two counts of witness tampering in the death of her five-year-old son Elijah Lewis, appears in Hillsborough Superior Court South, Sept. 26, 2024, in Nashua, N.H. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa, Pool, File)

A lawyer for the division has asked for the lawsuit to be dismissed, saying the state agency did not have custody of Elijah. A message seeking comment was sent to a lawyer representing Stapf's mother. No attorneys are listed for Stapf and Dauphinais in the lawsuit.

A visit to the doctor in November 2020 showed that Elijah weighed 32 pounds (14.5 kilograms) and had bruises on his face, eye and arm, prosecutors said. Dauphinais later told the agency that her son was sent to California to live with Dauphinais’ sister, a custody arrangement the father had agreed to, but Dauphinais didn’t follow through, prosecutors said.

By October 2021, Dauphinais had given birth to a boy at home, prosecutors said. Stapf brought the infant to a hospital with the intent to leave him there. The hospital found evidence of drugs in the baby and contacted the child services agency, which opened an investigation. The agency could find no signs of Elijah.

Dauphinais said her son was with her sister, and then her brother. Both relatives told investigators that Dauphinais had contacted them and asked them to lie about Elijah’s whereabouts.

Prosecutors believe Elijah died in September 2021 and the couple put his body in a container and brought him to the Massachusetts park, where Stapf dug a hole and buried him, prosecutors said.

When Elijah was still missing, Stapf and Dauphinais were arrested in New York. Days after their arrest, Elijah’s remains were found.

Prosecutors said that when Elijah was found, he was 3 feet (91 centimeters) tall and weighed 19 pounds (8.6 kilograms), while an average 5-year-old boy would be about 3.6 feet (1.1 meter) tall and closer to 40 pounds (18 kilograms).

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