A Princeton man was arrested Monday in connection with the February death of his girlfriend’s infant son.
Phillip E. Knee, 21, West Green Street, was taken into custody by Princeton police at 5:20 p.m. Monday in connection with the death of 10-month-old Ethan Lee Cotton.
Princeton Police Department spokesman Lt. R.L. Howton said that Knee’s arrest came after department investigators received autopsy results and conducted an interview Monday in the on-going investigation.
Knee is charged with murder and lodged in the Caldwell County Jail.
The Caldwell County Circuit Clerk’s office confirmed that Knee is scheduled for arraignment on the felony charge here at 1 p.m. Thursday afternoon.
Ethan Cotton died on Monday, Feb. 4. The infant was pro-nounced dead at 11:58 p.m. that evening at the Caldwell County Hospital Emergency Room.
The child was transported by Caldwell County EMS personnel who responsed to a 911 call of an unresponsive infant at 614 W. Green St.
Howton said that when police arrived on the scene EMS personnel had already removed the infant from the residence.
Caldwell County Acting Coroner Dwayne Trafford said that foul play in the infant’s death had been undetermined before the medical examiner issued findings early this week stating that the case merited further investigation.
Trafford said that a cause of death should be established in a ruling by Medical Examiner Dede Schluckbuier in about two weeks to a month.
The autopsy investigation started on Feb. 5. Trafford said that is routine to conduct an autopsy when a baby dies suddenly.
Howton said that officers investigating the death had interviewed the baby’s mother Janice Cotton and Knee, her boyfriend, at the time of death.
In the original interview, Knee told police officers that Cotton had been asleep and that he laid the infant down on a sofa with a bottle and went outside for a period of time.
Cotton told police in that preliminary investigation that she woke up and went outside with Knee. She said that it was when they came back inside the residence that the infant was unresponsive and not breathing.
“That’s a hard time to interview someone. We needed the knowledge of that autopsy report to proceed,” he said.
After the results of the autopsy were obtained, officers re-interviewed Knee. Police say that he admitted to “holding the infant with a bottle in its mouth until it stopped breathing.”
He told police that he laid the child on the couch then and walked outside the residence.
While Knee had been residing with Cotton on West Green Street, he was thought to be an Indiana native and the pair had lived for a time in Dawson Springs.
Police say that the investigation is continuing. Trafford said that cause of death ruling from the medical examiner is forthcoming.
