Childcare provider accused of shaking and throwing baby

FISHERS, Ind. -- The operator of an unlicensed day care admitted she threw a 4-month-old infant to the floor and violently shook the boy, Fishers police said.\nMelanie D. Ford, 29, was charged Wednesday with two counts of battery resulting in serious bodily injury, Fishers police said. She was in the Hamilton County Jail Thursday morning on $50,000 bond, jail officials said.\nThe baby, Clark Knight, suffered a skull fracture, bleeding on the brain and bleeding in the eyes, police said.\nFishers Police Sgt. Gerry Hepp said Ford called the family Jan. 17 to report the boy was ill and needed to be picked up from the day care she operated in her home in Fishers, a northeastern suburb of Indianapolis.\nThe boy's father, Paul Knight, said he was stunned when he arrived and found his youngest boy in Ford's arms.\n"He was completely full of sweat, lifeless and moaning," said Knight.\nHe took the boy to a hospital, and doctors called police.\nFord admitted Wednesday that she had thrown the boy onto her kitchen floor that day and had previously thrown him into a bassinet, Hepp said.\nHepp said Ford estimated she had shaken the child at least once earlier in January and as many as five times the day she said she threw him to the floor.\nShe said she had shaken and thrown him "because he would not stop crying," Hepp said.\nHepp said several other children had been in Ford's care, and police would be contacting them as part of their investigation.