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'Not truthful': Parents allowed 7-week-old baby to die while they played Call of Duty and watched YouTube, police say

 
Gracie Jai Tellez and Robert Lee Ingram appear in booking photos inset against an image of a residential street in Florida.

Inset left to right: Gracie Jai Tellez and Robert Lee Ingram (Broward Sheriff's Office). Background: The area where the defendants lived in Hollywood, Fla. (Google Maps).

A woman and man in Florida allowed their baby to die while playing Call of Duty, according to law enforcement in the Sunshine State.

Gracie Jai Tellez, 20, and Robert Lee Ingram, 22, both face charges of aggravated manslaughter of a child and child neglect causing great bodily harm — permanent disability or disfigurement, according to the Hollywood Police Department.

The investigation began in October 2025, when police responded to a home on Farragut Street in Hollywood — a large city to the north of Miami and part of the broader metro area.

At the residence, police found a 7-week-old baby girl. The infant was "non-responsive, pale and cold to the touch," according to an arrest affidavit obtained by West Palm Beach-based CBS affiliate WPEC and Miami-based independent TV station WPLG.

Responding officers performed CPR on the child until paramedics arrived and took over lifesaving efforts, police said. The baby was then rushed to Joe DiMaggio Children's Hospital and placed on life support.

At the hospital, doctors determined the child was suffering from a number of severe injuries, police said.

Among the child's maladies were skull fractures, retinal hemorrhaging and detachment, hemorrhaging along her spine, and a traumatic brain injury, according to the charging document.

Specialists told investigators the little girl's injuries were consistent with non-accidental head trauma caused both by blunt force as well as violent acceleration and deceleration of the child's head and body, or "violent shaking," law enforcement said.

On Oct. 18, 2025, the girl was declared brain dead.

On Oct. 22, 2025, she was removed from life support and died.

Both parents allegedly told investigators the baby was acting normally before she was placed into a bassinet after being fed, according to the affidavit. The defendants insisted they knew nothing about any kind of fall that would have caused the injuries, police said.

Detectives allegedly found inconsistencies in the parents' narratives.

Ingram, for his part, gave multiple different timelines about the child's feeding and placement into the bassinet, police said. Then, during a reenactment, he allegedly gave yet another version of events.

Both defendants said they used the FaceTime app on their cellphones as makeshift baby monitors, according to law enforcement. But detectives said they found no evidence that happened.

Rather, their cellphones had recently — and extensively — been used to play Call of Duty and watch YouTube during the overnight hours, police said. The video game playing and video watching occurred in the moments leading right up to when the infant was found unresponsive, according to the charging document.

"These forensic downloads show the information provided by Gracie Tellez and Robert Ingram was not truthful," police wrote.

Investigators also learned the infant had recently visited a pediatrician and was considered healthy. The doctor said she had no documented injuries or significant health concerns at the time.

Eventually, the Broward County Medical Examiner's Office determined the baby's cause of death was complications of blunt head trauma and the manner of death was found to be homicide.

The charging document was issued on July 27.

A fugitive investigation began on July 29 and the pair was arrested in Jacksonville, Florida, on Aug. 7 by the U.S. Marshals Service, according to a press release.

The Hollywood Police Department announced the arrests on Friday, Aug. 14. They both appeared in court this week for the first time where a court ordered them held in the Broward County Jail without bond.

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