Closing arguments are slated Tuesday in the murder trial of Michael P. McCarthy. The Boston man is accused of killing Bella Bond, originally known as “Baby Doe,” his girlfriend’s two-year-old daughter.
A passer-by found the little girl’s body on the shore of an island in Boston Harbor on June 25, 2015. A computer-enhanced image of what the girl probably looked like in life was named “Baby Doe” and was shared on billboards and on the Internet while authorities struggled to identify her.
Prosecutors allege McCarthy threw the girl’s body into what’s known as the Reserve Channel, a docking area leading out of the harbor, and that the girl’s body washed up on the shore of the island several weeks later.
The defense claims Rachelle Bond, the girl’s mother, is the real killer. Bond faced five days of intense questioning on the witness stand. The bulk of that time was spent under cross-examination by defense attorney Jonathan Shapiro. He suggested that Bond was lying on the witness stand to cover up her own involvement in the case. In return for pleading guilty to being an accessory to her daughter’s murder and for cashing social services checks earmarked for the girl’s care, Rachelle Bond faces credit for time served and two years of probation. She’ll be released as soon as the trial is over, so long as prosecutors agree that her testimony was truthful.
Bond testified that she walked into a room in the apartment she shared with McCarthy to see him punching Bella so hard that her body bounced off the mattress Bella was lying upon. Rachelle Bond claimed the girl was “swollen” and “gray,” and that despite CPR, the girl died. The mother’s memory is foggy, though, she claims, due to drug use.
A medical examiner testified that Bond’s story was unlikely based on Bella’s injuries.