Inset, left to right: Eastyn Deronjic (Boulger Funeral Home) and Shiann Lynn Erickson (Clay County Jail). Background: Authorities responding to the emergency call about Eastyn being found unresponsive in Moorhead, Minnesota (KVLY).
A 24-year-old woman in Minnesota will head to prison for killing her friend's 3-year-old son, who suffered months of physical abuse before he died.
Shiann Lynn Erickson reached a deal with prosecutors and will formally plead guilty to charges over the 2024 death of Eastyn Deronjic.
Erickson, who is currently charged with second-degree murder in the toddler's death, is scheduled to appear in Clay County District Court on April 7 for a change of plea hearing, court records show.
Erickson's co-defendant in the case, 26-year-old Rosa E. Garza, in May 2025 pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree murder and was sentenced to 20 years in a state correctional facility.
Under Minnesota state law, Garza, who now goes by the name "Mason Garza," is required to serve at least two-thirds of her sentence in prison, which is just over 13 years, and the final one-third on supervised probation.
As previously reported by Law&Crime, officers with the Moorhead Police Department and emergency medical personnel responded at about 1:09 a.m. on March 18, 2024, to an apartment complex in the 1500 block of Belsly Boulevard South in Moorhead regarding a 3-year-old child not breathing. The home is about 230 miles northwest of Minneapolis.
Upon arriving, first responders located the heavily bruised child, later identified as Eastyn, and performed lifesaving procedures before transporting him via ambulance to Sanford Hospital. The child died shortly after arriving at the facility.
Police said that Eastyn and his younger sibling had been staying with Garza and Erickson in their Moorhead home for "an extended period." Garza and Erickson were acquaintances of the children's biological parents.
Following Eastyn's death, his younger sister was removed from the home and placed into protective custody.
According to court documents, authorities on June 28, 2024, received Eastyn's autopsy report, which determined that the child's manner of death was a homicide and the cause of death was a blunt force injury that perforated his bowel. In addition to the fatal blow, Eastyn also suffered 28 additional blunt force injuries throughout his body.
A witness told police that she went to the defendants' home at about 1 a.m. on the night of Eastyn's death to watch him and his sister because Garza had to take Erickson to the hospital due to an illness. The witness said that when she got to the home, Eastyn appeared sick and was vomiting up whatever he had eaten. The boy asked the witness for a glass of water, but then began to cough and gag before becoming unresponsive. He was pronounced dead at the hospital less than two hours later.
The children's mother told police that she had not seen her kids in about two weeks. When she had last seen them, she said she believed Eastyn's bruises were due to him being "uncoordinated." She last spoke with the boy a few hours before his death, saying he sounded sick but OK, the complaint states.
Garza and Erickson claimed that the bruising on Eastyn's face happened the day before he died. They said he was vomiting over the toilet and passed out, hitting his head. Garza also claimed that the boy had fallen off his bike and skateboard that day.
Erickson claimed that Garza had been abusive toward her in the past, but said she had never seen Garza be violent with Eastyn. However, that claim was undercut when the couple turned their phones over to police.
In a message from March 17, 2024, the day Eastyn sustained his fatal injuries, Erickson was fighting with Garza and wrote: "Ok have fun with your little b—. Go beat on her kid."
Prior to changing her plea, Erickson had been scheduled to go to trial in May.