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Father is charged after toddler freezes to death

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published February 9, 2007

PITTSBURGH - A man angry because his toddler daughter wouldn't go to bed knocked her unconscious and left her to die outside in single-digit temperatures, police said.

The frozen body of Nyia Miangel Page, who was about to turn 2, was found Sunday at an abandoned playground about a 10-minute walk from the family's home. Tiny footprints in the snow suggest she had gotten up and wandered around before she died, police said.

Her father, William Lorenzo Page, 23, of Braddock, was arrested Wednesday on charges of criminal homicide, kidnapping, false reports and simple assault. He has been in custody since Sunday, when he was charged with sexually abusing another child shortly before Nyia died.

Page, who did not have an attorney at his arraignment Thursday morning, was jailed without bail.

Page told police he woke up early Saturday and found the girl awake and playing in the hallway, according to a criminal complaint filed Wednesday night. He said he got angry when she wouldn't go back to bed so he struck her, causing her to hit her head and become unconscious, according to the complaint.

Police said Page told them he took the girl outside wrapped in a blanket and left her, still breathing, beside railroad tracks near a bridge.

Police said a T-shirt, a pair of women's underwear and a Pittsburgh Steelers "Terrible Towel," all found in Page's basement, appeared to have been stained with blood.

An autopsy determined Nyia died of hypothermia, but the Allegheny County Medical Examiner ruled the death a homicide because investigators said it was unreasonable to assume the child had made it alone to the playground, which is on a wooded knoll.

Authorities said they could only guess how long Nyia, wearing only a sweater and a diaper, could have survived in temperatures that hovered around 2 degrees Saturday morning.

"Given her size, she would have been rendered incapacitated very quickly," Allegheny County Medical Examiner Karl E. Williams said Thursday.

A witness saw Page enter his house Saturday morning from the direction where the child was found, police said. He was out on the street an hour later, saying he was looking for the girl and telling the witness, "Somebody took my daughter," according to a criminal complaint.

Nyia's mother told police she last saw the girl after Nyia tried to crawl into bed with her parents about 12:30 a.m. Saturday. The mother told police she put the youngster back into her own bed in an upstairs room.

Police, emergency crews and bloodhounds searched for most of two days before finding the little girl's body.

The sexual abuse charge against Page came as police investigated Nyia's disappearance. Police said another child in the house told investigators that sometime Friday night, Page entered a bedroom, covered the child's mouth with one hand and touched the child's genitals with the other. The child said Page then left the room, followed by Nyia, police said.

[Last modified February 9, 2007, 01:07:30]