China Arnold (born March 29, 1980, in Dayton, Ohio) is an American convicted murderer.
Arnold, who had been convicted of abduction in 2000 and forgery in 2002, was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole on 8 September 2008 for killing her 28-day-old daughter, Paris. The infant was placed in a microwave oven for what analysts suspect was longer than 2 minutes and died shortly after removal. Death occurred because her internal temperature reached critical temperatures. In the words of medical examiner, Dr. Marcella Fierro, "she was cooked."
At the time, Arnold lived with her children and her boyfriend, Terrell Talley, in a housing complex. Prosecutors said that she placed Paris into the microwave after an argument with Talley over the baby's paternity; she told investigators that she was intoxicated. Arnold took Paris to the hospital the next day, where she died of her injuries. Arnold was arrested initially, then released due to lack of evidence. She was re-arrested in November 2006.
Shortly after Arnold's first trial began, Talley told the Dayton Daily News that his son told him that he pulled the baby's lifeless body out of the microwave after a neighbor's boy had put her in there; the claim resulted in a mistrial. However, at the second trial, the mother of the boy in question established that he was not at the housing complex when Paris died, and Arnold was convicted of aggravated murder.
On 5 November 2010, the Second District Court of Appeals reversed Arnold's conviction, citing misconduct by prosecutors and that the court erred by not allowing material witnesses to testify in Arnold's defense.
On 13 May 2011, a jury found Arnold guilty of aggravated murder. Her attorney had argued that the evidence pointed as much to Talley as it did Arnold, to no avail.
Arnold has been incarcerated at the Ohio Reformatory for Women since 11 September 2008.
On May 20, 2011, Arnold was sentenced to life in prison without parole. Her attorney says they will appeal the decision.
Famous quotes containing the words china and/or arnold:
“It all ended with the circuslike whump of a monstrous box on the ear with which I knocked down the traitress who rolled up in a ball where she had collapsed, her eyes glistening at me through her spread fingers—all in all quite flattered, I think. Automatically, I searched for something to throw at her, saw the china sugar bowl I had given her for Easter, took the thing under my arm and went out, slamming the door.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“Still, after many years, in distant lands,
Still nourishing in thy bewildered brain
That wild, unquenched, deep-sunken, old-world pain—
Say, will it never heal?”
—Matthew Arnold (1822–1888)