New Jersey nurse charged with scalding 2-year-old baby

JERSEY CITY, N.J. - A nurse has been charged with scalding a toddler, leaving the little girl in critical condition with third-degree burns, reports The Jersey Journal.

Ellen Ejimkonye, 30, was formally charged Monday with aggravated assault, endangering the welfare of a child and child abuse, according to the criminal complaint. Officials said Ejimkonye scalded the "lower extremities" of 2-year-old Destiny Malak, according to the paper. Destiny's family said the suspect was arrested on Saturday.

The Journal reports the girl's mother, Marium Khella, received a call from the suspect on Friday saying Destiny had a rash on her right leg. Khella, who was on her way back to her Jersey City, N.J., home, said she told the nurse to put cream on the rash but was horrified when she saw the extent of the burns on her child.

Khella said she found Destiny in her high chair, crying in soaking-wet clothes. The mother said she screamed for scissors so she could cut her daughter out of the clothes, according to the paper.

"I saw no skin," Khella told the Journal. "The baby's skin came off in my hand."

Destiny's uncle, Rob Gurgis, said the family thinks the toddler was in scalding hot bath water for "at least 15 minutes for this to happen.... There is absolutely permanent scarring - emotionally, not just physically."

Gurgis told the paper Destiny is at St. Barnabas Medical Center in Livingston, N.J., receiving treatment for her injuries.

The Journal reports Destiny was born prematurely and requires the care of in-home nurses. She is on a feeding tube and Gurgis says she will need extreme grafting to minimize the burn scars that cover more than 18 percent of her body.

The victim's uncle said Ejimkonye should have called 911, but instead put the girl's clothes back on. He said the family had previous issues with the nurse and had requested that the agency she worked for no longer send her.