A jury convicted a Lake Station man late Wednesday in his then-fiance’s three-year-old son’s death, court sources said. They deliberated for about four hours.
Joseph Pridemore, 34, was charged in November 2021 with the Oct. 12, 2021, murder of Keegan Fugate.
His sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 21.
The child had a dislocated neck and internal bleeding, a lacerated liver and bruised organs, trauma to his lungs with several bruises from different times on his abdomen, face and head, according to an affidavit.
The mother, Kylie Fugate pleaded guilty to neglect of a dependent. She was sentenced to 10 years in prison, plus another three years probation last year.
Deputy Prosecutors Kasey Dafoe and Chris Bruno said Monday that Pridemore was responsible for the child’s death. He was the only adult there while Fugate was at work. Court records allege he previously abused the boy.
Defense lawyer John Cantrell blamed Kylie Fugate, calling her parenting and credibility into question on cross examination. She “disciplined,” or abused the boy, and they barely had any relationship before he came to live with the couple three weeks before he died, he argued.
“Joseph Pridemore didn’t kill his stepson,” Cantrell said via text after the verdict Thursday. “The case is such a sad story. Any jury would want someone to blame. However, the wrong person was convicted of causing this child’s death.”
Lead detective Antwan Jakes, formerly of the Lake County Sheriff’s Department Gary Metro Homicide Unit, testified most of Wednesday morning detailing his investigation to Deputy Prosecutor Chris Bruno.
Fugate had lied to him early on that Pridemore’s mom was watching the boy while she worked at a gas station shift. That was dispelled by other relatives, he said. She admitted it after calling detectives to set up a second interview.
Calls, texts, and messages between Pridemore and Fugate had been deleted off both phones before Oct. 14. Investigators weren’t able to get most of what was said between them, but cell phone records showed a pattern of communication between their cell phones, Jakes said.
Pridemore wasn’t cooperative with investigators. He first gave an interview after he was arrested in November 2021. Police were tipped where he was staying. He took off in a car, then was arrested after a foot chase. Fugate had been with him earlier, but she was arrested at a Lake Station gas station.
At a police station, Pridemore was held in a room next door to her. Video showed him pacing, then putting his ear to the wall to try to hear what Fugate might be saying in the other room. A computer system issue corrupted the audio on Pridemore’s police interview, so it couldn’t be replayed.
Pridemore told investigators that he was babysitting Keegan when the boy started vomiting. He gave him fluids like Sprite and water. The boy appeared “googly eyed,” Jakes recalled him saying. When the boy wasn’t breathing, he started giving CPR and told Fugate to call 911.
Pridemore “appeared frustrated” and stopped the interview, the detective said.
Defense lawyer John Cantrell asked if Jakes knew why Fugate lied to him.
In earlier court testimony, Fugate said the Indiana Department of Child Services had opened a case when the boy was a baby. She voluntarily transferred custody of Keegan to her mom around when he was about 2 or 3-months-old. Since then, she had supervised visits until the three weeks when he came to live with her before his death, since her mother suddenly could not care for him.
In earlier testimony, Fugate said Pridemore had opposed the boy moving in with them, saying it was a bad idea. Pridemore in court appeared to shake his head.
Cantrell on Wednesday also questioned why investigators didn’t take his fingernails for DNA samples, since that is often done in murder cases to help identify a suspect. Jakes responded that the Lake County Coroner’s Office didn’t believe the child had any defensive wounds.
Cantrell asked Jakes if they received money from a GoFundMe account she set up, with Pridemore listed as a beneficiary.
“To my knowledge, no,” he replied.
Lawyers clarified in court that Lake County Coroner’s Office Forensic Pathologist Dr. Zhuo Wang testified Tuesday that the boy had his liver injured up to three days before he died. His lungs were injured up to 24 hours before. Not all of the many torso bruises probably happened over time.
Jakes also said that Larry Tindall — Pridemore’s dad who questioned the child’s face bruises — told Fugate he would call the cops if he saw other marks after he saw the first major bruises to his face. Tindall testified separately Tuesday that it was about a week before the boy died.
The jury asked Jakes nearly 20 written questions.
In response to one, Jakes told them that Keegan’s likely biological father was completely uncooperative with the investigation and he felt he couldn’t make him come to the police station if he wasn’t a suspect.
Cantrell questioned this, saying police could bring him in if he was charged with an unrelated crime, for example.
Keegan “loved everyone,” including strangers, his aunt Karson Nowacki, Fugate’s sister, said Wednesday. Buzz Lightyear was his favorite toy character.
“I’m sure he loved Joe, even after what he had to endure,” she said. “He loved Kylie. I saw that.”
When asked if he liked being a big brother, she didn’t know, because he’d only been living at the apartment with the youngest boy for three weeks. I thought (having brothers nearby) would be good for him, she added.
Gary Police were called Oct. 12, 2021, to Methodist Hospitals Northlake after a child died with “suspicious bruising,” according to court documents.
Fugate’s behavior was “a little odd,” police wrote in documents. She appeared stoic when she peaked around hospital curtains at her son, but started crying uncontrollably when police looked at her.
She first told police Pridemore’s mother was watching the boy, but later admitted he watched the child in the hours before his death, according to court records. The child was eating a hamburger and seemed fine before she left for work at a gas station around 3 p.m.
By 5:30 p.m., Pridemore texted her several times that the child was vomiting several times, and he gave him fluids, broth and Tylenol.
Pridemore’s sister later told Fugate that his mother wouldn’t lie to the police for her.
“Well, I’m screwed then,” she allegedly texted.
When Fugate got home from her shift hours later, the child was “breathing heavily,” but she didn’t call 911 until overnight when he vomited again and Pridemore said he stopped breathing and she saw the child was turning purple, the affidavit states.
She told detectives that Pridemore said some abrasions were from the dog knocking the child down, or he jumped off the couch. She had been asking him for a few days why there were marks on the boy, but none on her other two children.
Fugate denied the boy was afraid of Pridemore, but said he had kept some distance from him, for example, in a room where the child hugged everyone except him.
Pridehouse had a “temper” and “struck her out of anger,” she said. When she was pregnant, she alleged Pridemore knocked her into a table, giving her a bloody nose, according to court records.
The child “suddenly stopped breathing” at 4:30 a.m., Fugate later wrote on a GoFundMe page for his funeral expenses. He was “young, smart and full of love,” she wrote. The page was subsequently removed from the site.
