Photo: Mark Erickson/Getty Images
The 5-year-old boy who was thrown over athird-floor railing at Minnesota’s Mall of Americalast week is making “small steps towards the healing process,” a family friend wrote ona GoFundMe pagecollecting donations to help with the family’s expenses.
The child, named Landen, sustained severe head trauma and multiple broken bones in his arms and legs.
While Landen’s “condition is again similar to previous days,” he’s on the mend, Hanneman said.
“Each new day is a good day,” he wrote. “Landen’s recovery is expected to be ongoing for a long time. While it’s hard to estimate costs, this will change everything for their family and require much of their time and focus.”
The campaign has nearly met its $1 million goal, and Hanneman said he might raise the goal amount.
Emmanuel Deshawn Aranda.Bloomington Police Department
Hanneman also established Prayers for Landen, a P.O. box for those who’d like to send cards or well-wishes to the child. Letters can be sent to the family at P.O. Box 43516 in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, 55443-4200.
On Monday, authorities alleged that Emmanuel Deshawn Aranda, the 24-year-old suspect, was intentionally “looking for someone to kill” at the mall.
Aranda is currently jailed on suspicion of attempted premeditated first-degree murder, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years to life in prison. It could not be determined if he’d obtained an attorney to speak on his behalf.
“This crime has shocked the community,” Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman said Monday in a statement announcing the charge. “That a child, with his mother, at a safe public place like a mall, could be violently attacked for no reason is chilling to everyone.”
• Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage?Click hereto get breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases in the True Crime Newsletter.
Freeman said prosecutors will seek a $2 million bond to hold Aranda in jail for now, and “would pursue a longer sentence based on the aggravating factors of particular cruelty, the vulnerability of the boy and committing the violent act in front of other children and the boy’s mother,” according to a statement from his office.
Aranda allegedly told police he had first considered choosing to kill an adult at the mall on Thursday “because they usually stand near the balcony,” but that did not “work out,” the criminal complaint states.
About 10:15 a.m. Friday, Aranda was back at the mall, where he allegedly approached the victim and the victim’s mother as they stood outside the Rainforest Café on the third floor with another parent and child.
When the victim’s mother saw Aranda, whom she had never seen before, approaching, she reportedly asked if they should move out of his way.
Then, the complaint alleges, Aranda “without warning” picked up the boy and threw him over the railing to the first floor, which Bloomington Police Chief Jeff Potts earlier estimated to be about 40 feet.
Hanneman also noted Wednesday that there is also a photo circulating purporting to show Landen’s mother in a surgical mask, sitting at his hospital bedside.
“This is not a picture of Landen or his mother,” he wrote. “We will not be releasing any photos during the recovery process. The family is still seeking as much privacy as possible — please be respectful of their wishes as they travel a road none of us would ever want to have to walk.”
source: people.com
