Testifies that round wounds on child were eczema

EDWARDSVILLE A Livingston mans eczema defense and pleas to the public failed him, as a jury Wednesday took just 27 minutes to convict him of aggravated battery to a child.

Eric Duane Hurley, 32, took the witness stand in his own behalf Wednesday, and insisted the circular wounds, described by the victim and her doctor as burns, were sudden outbursts of eczema, an allergic skin rash. The child had bouts of eczema, but doctors testified that the skin rash did not resemble the round wounds seen in pictures shown to the jury.

Hurley was arrested and charged in October 2010, about two weeks after the child reported to her biological father that Mr. Eric had burned her with a cigarette because she would not stop crying.

Hurley and the childs mother appeared on the Dr. Phil Show in August 2012. The child had just turned 3 when she was burned and is now 6.

The father took her to a Litchfield emergency room, and hospital personnel called the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, which conducted an investigation. Shortly after that, the mother gave up custody, and the child was placed in custody of the father.

The father took the child to her pediatrician, Dr. Chris Wangard, who examined her. The doctor, a board certified pediatrician, testified this week that the marks were intentionally inflicted wounds, consistent with cigarette burns. He told the jury he had treated the child for eczema, and the burn marks did not look like the allergic skin rash.

Hurleys own witness, Dr. Barry Zeffren, a board certified allergist, testified that eczema has non-specific borders, contrary to the round marks created by the cigarette burns. The doctor saw the child almost a year before the burning incident and confirmed that she suffered from eczema.

Defense attorney Steve Griffin, in his closing argument, also advanced the eczema theory, but offered an alternative theory, that the mother burned the child.

I dont believe they were burns, at all, Hurley testified. He vigorously denied burning the child.

Hurley and the victims mother appeared on the Dr. Phil Show in 2012 to deny burning the 3-year-old child, and apparently Hurley posted comments on The Telegraphs Facebook page Tuesday evening claiming that the story of the burns was made up by the childs biological father in the midst of a custody battle.

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Testifies that round wounds on child were eczema