Editor’s note: This story contains descriptions of violence against a child.
The father of a 5-year-old New Hampshire boy whose body was found in Massachusetts in 2021 has filed a wrongful death suit against the boy’s mother, her boyfriend and the New Hampshire youth services departments.
Elijah Lewis, of Merrimack, was found dead in Ames Nowell State Park in Abington in October 2021 after being reported missing by the New Hampshire Health and Human Services Department’s Division for Children, Youth and Families a (DCYF) a week earlier. Police found the boy’s body after about a day of searching the park based on a lead regarding where he was buried.
The day after his body was found, Elijah’s mother, Danielle Dauphinais, and her boyfriend, Joseph Stapf, were arrested in New York. Dauphinais was later charged with first-degree murder in her son’s death, but has not yet been tried, and Stapf pleaded guilty to manslaughter and assault in connection with Elijah’s death in September 2022.
- Read more: Body of Elijah Lewis, missing 5-year-old New Hampshire boy, found in Abington, officials say
Last week, Elijah’s father, Timothy Lewis, filed a civil lawsuit against Dauphinais and Stapf based on allegations that they abused, neglected and eventually killed Elijah. The lawsuit also names the DCYF as a defendant, arguing that it did not follow its own policies and procedures while investigating Elijah’s living situation in 2020, and that not doing so resulted in the boy being left in the care of the woman who later killed him.
“As a result of Defendants’ actions or Defendants’ inaction, Elijah suffered malnourishment, facial and scalp injuries, pressure ulcers, acute fentanyl intoxication, violence and neglect, that ultimately resulted in his death,” the lawsuit reads.
The lawsuit asks that a judge award Lewis compensatory and punitive damages based on counts of assault, battery, neglect, breach of fiduciary duty and wrongful death.
How Elijah ended up in his mother’s care
The nearly 50-page lawsuit tells the story of a young child who had behavioral issues — possibly due to Fetal Alcohol Syndrome — who was left in the care of his drug-addicted mother despite the fact that she didn’t have custody of him and repeatedly said she did not want and was not able to care for him.
Prior to the summer of 2020, Elijah lived with his father in Arizona and hadn’t seen Dauphinais since he was a baby, according to the lawsuit. Earlier in the year, she’d reached out and asked for Elijah to come stay with her in New Hampshire for a month.
But the stay ultimately ended up lasting over a year, initially because Dauphinais had asked to prolong the visit, according to the lawsuit. Despite this, by the end of the summer, Dauphinais told Lewis she wanted her son to go back to Arizona because his behavior problems had worsened significantly and he’d become violent towards himself and everyone around him.
But Dauphinais’ claims about Elijah’s behavior caused Lewis to be so concerned for the safety of his other children that he no longer wanted to take Elijah back, according to the lawsuit. As Dauphinais’ pleas to have Elijah removed from her home became more and more desperate in the latter months of 2020, she and Lewis came up with various plans for a new home for Elijah, but none ever materialized.
Why the DCYF never stepped in
In the fall of 2020, Dauphinais’ repeatedly notified authorities of disturbing, abusive and extreme behavior by Elijah, who was not receiving mental health care, according to the lawsuit. The DCYF opened an investigation into Elijah’s living situation in October 2020, and initially found many reasons to be concerned for his well-being.
However, around Christmas of that year, Dauphinais told the DCYF that Elijah’s behavior had completely turned around and he’d become a “sweet boy,” according to the lawsuit. Despite a mountain of evidence that Dauphinais could not manage Elijah’s behavior and did not want to care for him, the DCYF appeared to take her at her word and closed his case on the basis that it was “unfounded.”
“Despite any reasonable person recognizing Elijah had severe psychiatric needs and parents who were unable to manage those needs, DCYF failed to do what it is actually charged with doing under the law – protect Elijah,” the lawsuit reads.
In doing so, the DCYF violated its own rigorous policies and procedures for evaluating and investigating child protection cases, according to the lawsuit. Around the same time, Dauphinais cut off contact between Elijah and Lewis, and Elijah remained in the home she shared with Stapf and his mother over the next nine months.
How and when Elijah was killed
Beginning around the start of 2021, Dauphinais and Stapf repeatedly and mercilessly abused Elijah, causing serious and long-term injuries, according to the lawsuit. The court filing details an alarming range of ways in which Elijah was harmed during this time, as well as communications between Dauphinais and her boyfriend in which Stapf asked Dauphinais to stop or lessen the abuse and she declined, once even calling her son a “maggot.”
“Danielle and Joseph couldn’t handle the little boy, and so, they beat him, tortured him, starved him, and eventually, killed him,” the lawsuit reads.
On Sept. 21, Dauphinais beat Elijah so badly in the bathroom of her home that the floor tiles cracked, according to the lawsuit. The boy was left naked, covered only by his own blood, and within three days of being carried to his room following the beating, he died there.
Dauphinais and Stapf then worked to cover up Elijah’s murder, enlisting family members to lie on their behalf and eventually burying the boy in Ames Nowell State Park two weeks after he died, according to the lawsuit. What ultimately prompted the DCYF to look into Elijah’s well-being and later declare him missing was Dauphinais’ surrendering of a drug-addicted newborn under New Hampshire’s safe haven law.
