Murder suspect texted that he hit child

CRANSTON, RI (WPRI) - Murder defendant Michael Patino texted that he punched 6 year old Marco Nieves 3 times, in one of several potentially incriminating text messages that may never be seen by a jury.

A log of text messages was obtained by Target 12 from the Superior Court case file and is part of what Judge Judith Savage called ‘a tsunami of illegal evidence collected by Cranston Police’.

Nieves died on October 4, 2009. The log contains a heated text message conversation from the evening before between Patino and Nieves’ mother Trisha Oliver, who was his girlfriend at the time.

“I punch dat lil ***** 3 times,” Patino texted in all capital letters in one instance according to the log. “Da hardest 1 was on his stomach cuz he moved. But let him b a man and not a lil ***** like u.”

Judge Savage ruled that Patino had a reasonable expectation of privacy and that text messages collected by Cranston Police from his cell phone were gathered illegally.

In her 190 page decision, Judge Savage admonished several details of the investigation, including how detectives used text messages during a 3 hour interrogation of Patino on the day Nieves died. Police had yet to obtain a search warrant for the information they used during the questioning of Patino.

• Read Judge Savage's Ruling

Court documents indicate Patino and Oliver exchanged messages about how Nieves was sick and throwing up repeatedly while also telling his mother that his stomach hurt.

“Of course he is gonna be all hurt and cryin,” Oliver texted. “Cuz u ****** beat the **** out of him.”

Oliver texted that Nieves' 'eyes keep rollin in the back of his head’.

In another text, Patino suggested that she should ‘rub his stomach’ and give him ‘water wit lemon’. As the evening progressed, Oliver texted that her son was still sick, asking Patino this; “WT* did you do to my son mike.”

Patino responded about a minute later with this message.

“I told you I went to punch him on his back again and he moved and I hit him on his stomach.”

The defendant suggested in another text that food was causing the problem but also texted an apology about punching the child.

“My bad. I'm really sorry about dat.”

About 24 hours later, Nieves died at Hasbro Children’s Hospital.

Patino’s attorney David Cooper would not comment directly about the content of the messages but insisted there was no intent by Patino.

“If anything happened,” Cooper said. “It was an accident.”

He went on the say the issue in the case is that the evidence was not obtained legally by Cranston Police.

"There was no chain of evidence. The phones were handled by four or five different officers long before they even had a warrant."

Cranston Police would not comment on the text messages. The Attorney General’s office has not revealed whether or not Judge Savage’s ruling will be appealed but Cooper said he expects an appeal.

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