Baby Genital Mutilation Trial on Tap

Five-week-old Holden Gothia was sleeping one morning in March 2007 inside the suburban Houston apartment he shared with his parents when he was viciously attacked.

Authorities found Holden lying on a queen-size bed, the lower half of his tiny body covered in blood after his genitals had been severed.

His mother, Katherine Nadal, told police that the family dog, a 12-pound tan and black dachshund, attacked her son. But prosecutors say it was Nadal, high on drugs at the time, who used a sharp object to mutilate her son.

Holden survived, but the severed body parts were never found.

Nadal, in jail since being charged with injury to a child, is set to go on trial as jury selection begins Aug. 6. She faces up to life in prison if convicted.

"The dog inflicted the injuries. My client did not do anything to cause those," said Allen Isbell, Nadal's attorney.

Isbell said he will present expert testimony to show the wounds were consistent with those caused by a dog.

Nadal had been sleeping next to Holden when she woke up and found her son had been attacked by the dog, Isbell said. But Isbell added his client did not see the dog attack her son.

Police say Nadal was the only person in the apartment with her son. Holden's father, Camden Gothia, who was not married to Nadal, was at work and later told police that his son had colic and had been crying a lot for several days before the attack.

George Flynn, a spokesman for the Harris County district attorney's office, declined to comment before the trial.

But the criminal complaint in the case says a veterinarian employed by Houston Animal Control and a doctor at the University of Texas Medical School at Houston both concluded the dog, which was 6 to 8 months old at the time, could not have caused Holden's wounds.

The doctor "stated that the injuries were certainly not caused by a dog (which would have produced ragged edges), but rather by a person using a sharp cutting instrument," according to the criminal complaint. The dog was later adopted.

Investigators were not able to find the "unknown object" they allege was used against Holden. Isbell said authorities tested all sharp instruments in the apartment, including the garbage disposal, and found no blood or DNA evidence.

Nadal was originally indicted in August 2007 but last month she was reindicted to further allege that she failed "to provide care and protection for (Holden), caused by abusing dangerous drugs and controlled substances, when (Holden) was in the sole physical possession of the defendant."

Officials have said Nadal, 28, had a history of prescription drug abuse and tested positive for cocaine and methadone the day after Holden was mutilated.

Nadal had been at an inpatient treatment program outside Houston before police arrested her two months after the attack. She had also been arrested in 2006 on a drug charge but the case was dropped after a grand jury declined to indict her.

"I'm sure they will try to portray her as a user of drugs," Isbell said.

Joel Androphy, a Houston attorney not connected to the case, said the nature of the crime and the fact that it involves a child already gives Nadal "2.9 strikes."

"All this jury will think about is the mutilation and this poor boy will have to grow up deformed," he said. "They will want to protect the child and the only way to protect the child will be to convict the mother."

Holden, now 2 years old, lives with Camden Gothia's sister and her husband, who were given permanent custody after Nadal and Gothia relinquished their parental rights. But Holden's father still sees him regularly, said Child Protective Services spokeswoman Estella Olguin.

"He's doing great," Olguin said of Holden. "He's very talkative, smart, healthy and happy."

Holden does have to wear a lift on his left foot because of a bone malformation on his left leg, which was also injured. It's uncertain if he will have surgery to reconstruct his genitals because the procedure could cost millions of dollars and Medicaid won't pay for it because it is considered cosmetic, Olguin said.