Shawn Dotson, Father of Murdered Toddler Emilliano Terry, Says Camilia Terry Kept Child Away from Him

Shawn Dotson, the father of Emilliano Terry, surfaces and said Camilia Terry kept the boy away from him, saying, “I guess she felt as if she couldn’t be involved with me, I couldn’t be involved with him,” News Net 5 reports. Shawn Dotson, now 19, was a freshman when he met Camilia Terry in high school. By then, she had already had one child at age 14 by someone else. Um, if you put lipstick on a pig, it’s still a pig. It’s quite simple, Shawn Dotson didn’t accept responsibility for the child when he was born.

Dotson thought the child was living with his mother out of state until he learned that the boy was missing. ”There’s a deep part of me who feels that it is partially my fault. So, I mean, it eats me up you know,” he said. “I mean, every kid needs a father, you know.  If he had his father in his life or round him, I’m like 99.9 percent sure that wouldn’t have happened. He’d be secure. He’d be safe with me.”

“She was just a young girl,” said Porsha Dotson, Shawn’s mother. “So, you know, every young girl goes through their ‘I don’t want a baby’ or ‘I had a baby by this guy. I’m young.’ But talking with her and visiting with her when she was over at my house, no, I had no clue.”

Porsha Dotson said she offered to raise Emilliano, but that never happened. Now, she will see that he gets a proper burial.”I want to make sure we give him a proper burial so we’ll know that he is finally at rest, because he never had rest. It was just sad,” she said. Source

It’s hard to expect a teen to assume the role of an adult, but Shawn Dotson knew he had a son and could have gone through the court system to make sure his rights as a parent were enforced. So, saying he thought Camilia Terry was out-of-state isn’t good enough grounds to shirk his responsibility as a parent. He was morally and legally responsible for his son, no matter what Camilia Terry said. He didn’t take responsibility then and he isn’t taking responsibility now. These are the young black men President Obama chided during a speech at a black church, pleading with them to step up and stop being absentee fathers. So many people failed Emilliano Terry, including that vicious cycle of abuse that started when Camilia Terry was shuttled back and forth through foster care. That was a sleeping monster that woke up and killed an innocent child.