A 29-year-old Mansfield man has been sentenced to 50 years in prison for beating his girlfriend’s 2-year-old daughter so severely in 2010 that she remains in a vegetative state.

Palmer reached a plea bargain agreement on Wednesday in state district Judge Louis Sturns’ court and pled guilty to aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and causing serious bodily injury to a child for abusing Ahnnakha “Annie” White.

Palmer’s plea came exactly five months after a jury sentenced Palmer’s live-in girlfriend, Ryka Hopper, to 40 years in prison for failing to seek medical attention for her daughter.

During her trial, prosecutors Eric Nickols and Kelly Meador presented evidence that during the first week of June 2010, Palmer shot her daughter in the foot with a BB gun and later held her down and removed the BB with a knife.

Two weeks later, Hopper arrived home and found her daughter unconscious on the floor. When the child awoke crying, Palmer picked her up and shook her violently. The child had difficulty walking and talking for 17 days. The child went into full cardiac arrest on July 12, 2010, and remains in a coma.

Palmer has previously served prison time for beating another little girl in 2003.

Melody McDonald

Public Information Officer

Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney's Office

401 West Belknap

Fort Worth, TX 76196

817-884-3120 (direct)

817-821-3935 (cell)

mjmcdonald@tarrantcounty.com

 Twitter: @TarrantDAOffice