A Calgary father has been charged with second-degree murder almost a year after the death of his four-year-old daughter, police said Wednesday.
Olive Rebekah Oluwafemi was found in cardiac arrest when emergency crews were called to a southeast home on Dec. 19, 2014. Police said she wasn’t breathing when she was taken to hospital, and died a short time later.
“The cause of death was blunt force injuries,” Staff Sgt. Colin Chisholm said Wednesday. “We believe there were injuries…upwards of weeks prior to the incident.”
Olive’s death was deemed a homicide in January. Chisholm said the family of three had been living in Calgary for approximately two years prior to the death of Olive, but had left just weeks after her death.
Chisholm said Wednesday her father was a suspect from the beginning of the investigation, but it took a long time to lay charges because medical evidence in child and infant deaths “takes extra long to come back.”
“At the time, investigators believed the injuries that caused her death were inflicted within the family home, and were not the result of play, an accident such as falling downstairs, nor medical intervention consistent with cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR),” police said in a release Wednesday. Chisholm said police were initially told Olive fell downstairs in the family home.
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WATCH: Staff Sgt. Colin Chilholm speaks to media after Calgary police charged Oluwatosin Oluwafemi with the second-degree murder of his daughter Olive in January 2015.
Olive’s father, Oluwatosin Oluwafemi, was arrested while in his home province of Ontario on Dec. 8, 2015. The 39-year-old Keswick, Ont. native was flown back to Calgary then, and charged early Wednesday morning.
He is set to appear in court on Dec. 10.
Police said Olive’s mother was uncooperative throughout the investigation, but added no other charges are being considered at this time.
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