Ashanti Hamilton: Child Abuser?

Where Milwaukee aldermen go, scandals seem to follow.

It's like a curse or something.

The latest case: Alderman Hamilton faces claim of child abuse

Ashanti Hamilton - Milwaukee's talented but often-troubled alderman - now is under investigation on suspicion of beating his 6-year-old daughter over the weekend.

"It is under review," Deputy District Attorney Kent Lovern said Wednesday after the north side Common Council member met with a prosecutor earlier in the day. Hamilton is expected to discuss the matter again with prosecutors. Lovern added, "We will have a better idea next week."

Hamilton initially denied Wednesday that he was being accused of child abuse, suggesting instead that he was the victim of "character assassination" by his ex-wife, Connie Caston Hamilton. She could not be reached for comment.

But the 35-year-old politician later said he had struck his daughter because he believed she was misbehaving while she was with him Sunday. But Hamilton argued that he didn't cross the line into abuse.

"She did get disciplined, but it wasn't bad," he said outside the district attorney's office. He then remarked of the allegation, "This one is below low."

His lawyer, Michael Chernin, said: "He absolutely denies the abuse. He loves his daughter."

Child abuse is such a serious claim to make against a parent.

I think it's really important not to rush to judgment. I don't know the circumstances of the case, but I do know that Hamilton hasn't been charged. A claim is not a charge.

Milwaukee Police Department spokeswoman Anne E. Schwartz declined to discuss the case, saying she could not even confirm whether there was an investigation.

I think it's awfully strange that Daniel Bice and the Journal Sentinel are rushing to put the allegations against Hamilton out there even though he hasn't been charged and the Police Department won't even confirm that there's an investigation underway. The privacy of the Hamilton children is not being protected.

The Journal Sentinel and local TV news outlets didn't release the name of the Johnson Controls executive, Alok Kumar, until he was formally charged with "one count of use of a computer to facilitate a child sex crime."

Hamilton isn't receiving that luxury.

...According to Hamilton and other sources, he and his ex-wife share custody of their four children. They stayed with him at his north side home over the weekend.

On Sunday, he returned the children to their mother's house. Sources say she then took the girl to Aurora Sinai Medical Center. Because the youngster had a cut and linear red marks on her legs and hands, these sources said, hospital authorities called the cops. Sources said it is believed that Hamilton hit the girl with a metal hanger.

Hamilton was interviewed by Milwaukee police after 10 p.m. Sunday. Because he is an elected official, the matter is being handled by MPD's Professional Performance Division, formerly known as internal affairs.

Chernin said it was understandable that hospital officials called authorities.

"When a treatment center has an allegation of child abuse, there's a compulsion to report it," he said. "But that doesn't end the analysis, and that's not conclusory."

The abuse allegation is the latest personal problem to plague the twice-elected alderman.

Beginning in 2006, Hamilton and his ex-wife, who now goes by the name Isis Muhammad, spent nearly two years in divorce court trying to settle their differences. Shortly before they filed for divorce, Hamilton obtained a restraining order against Muhammad. His mother, Myra Hamilton-Horton, pleaded guilty two years ago to maintaining a drug-trafficking place.

In addition, a bank also filed a foreclosure suit because he was failing to pay his monthly mortgage. He also was ticketed for supposedly getting into a scuffle with a political opponent in 2007.

Obviously, a parent shouldn't discipline a child by hitting her with a metal hanger, leaving cuts and red linear marks on the child. I certainly consider that to be abuse.

But I also think it's wrong to put out reports that unduly subject children to this sort of media attention, violating confidentiality and potentially causing them harm.
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Ashanti Hamilton's statement
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UPDATE, April 1, 2009: Ashanti Hamilton: Booked and Released
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UPDATE, April 14, 2009: Ashanti Hamilton: Felony Child Abuse
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UPDATE, May 27, 2009: Ashanti Hamilton: Plea Agreement