Toddler's Mother Testifies at Child Abuse Hearing

Two witnesses spoke in court Friday afternoon at a hearing for a Northville man facing charges of repeatedly hitting and burning a toddler with a lighter.

The child's mother and the officer who responded to the report of abuse detailed what they thought happened to the boy left in Dylan James Dunlap's care last month.

Dunlap, 19, faces multiple charges, one of them being torture, which carries a potential sentence of life in prison. Dunlap was left in charge of the toddler with his girlfriend, who is the boy's aunt, May 5 and 6 at an apartment located on Northridge Drive in Northville Township.

Judge James A. Plakas of 35th District Court approved Wayne County prosecuting attorney Aimee Fowler's request for mutual sequestration of the witnesses. This means that they cannot discuss the case with anyone even after testifying. 

The toddler's mother, Victoria Busch, was first to testify. Her son, Joshua Busch, who is now two years old was regularly looked after by her sister, Olivia Kwiatkowski, who is Dunlap's girlfriend.

"He looked like he had been crying for hours," she said about when she first saw him May 6. "When I would try to hold him, he would want to be left alone."

Fowler asked Busch to look at several photographs that police took of her son's injuries. She went through one by one describing bruises across his face, torso, back and neck and burns on his wrist, hands and lips. Another photo showed a human bite mark on his leg, she said. She paused her testimony while looking at one photo because she was overcome with tears. The photo showed finger marks above a larger bruise in the center of her son's back, she said.

"He does not sleep through the night any more," Busch said. 

She said her son would sleep 10 to 12 hours in one night but now wakes up two to five times.

Other than that, he is physically better and is able to play normally.

Busch said her sister, who lives in the same apartment complex, picked up her son in the afternoon on May 5. She said she got a text from Dunlap's phone early the next morning, saying she didn't have to worry about taking Joshua to daycare. She said she texted Dunlap's phone around 10:30 a.m. May 6 asking how things were. 

"They said they didn't take him to daycare because of bruises from the dog," she said.

She wanted to know how bad it was so she asked Dunlap to send a photo, she said. The first photo showed bruises on his cheeks and near his eyes and the second photo showed his whole face with more bruises including on the neck, she said.

"I didn't think a dog did it. I thought maybe he fell," she said.

Her boss at the gas station where she works saw the photos and called Plymouth police who contacted Northville Township police, she said. Officer Christopher Cox met her at her apartment building and together they went to Kwiatkowski's apartment. 

Watch video and read about Cox's testimony.

Plakas said the hearing will continue with more witness testimony on Thursday at 35th District Court.