Sean A. Flowers Jr. of Milwaukee allegedly drowned his 3-month-old son in a pond. He was taken into custody Saturday after he reportedly held his son underwater until the infant fell unconscious, according to the New York Daily News.
Robert Amstadt, who witnessed the incident, said that the "baby cried all the way out into the water. Then the crying stopped."
Neighbors reported that the body of water was near an apartment complex where Flowers, 25, had been arguing with his girlfriend, the baby's mother, beforehand during a family reunion.
According to the Daily News, witnesses crowded around the pond as the incident was unfolding. They told police that Flowers entered the water, sat down and held his son underwater. A few of the witnesses reportedly tried to intervene by trying to retrieve the baby boy from Flowers, but he snatched the baby away.
"I grabbed it. I tried to swim away with it," reported another witness, Joey Griffin. "He lunged at me and took the baby again and swam further, deeper."
Once officers arrived, it was too late. Milwaukee firefighters tried to revive the infant but were unable to.
Flowers reportedly had a history of problems, having had a restraining order filed against him in 2015 by his girlfriend—who reportedly has another child with him—and pleading guilty to theft charges in 2012 after being accused of stealing a purse with his girlfriend.
Read more at the New York Daily News.