Unimaginable Cruelty. Cigarettes Put Out On His Face, Not Fed For Weeks – The Story Of Myls Dobson
Before we jump into today’s video, I’d like to take a moment to say thank you to Monique Dobson, a loved one of Myls Dobson, the child we will be discussing today. Monique reached out to me a few months ago asking me to tell Myls’s story in full, not only to keep Myls’s memory alive but to help raise awareness to situations like these.
If you lived in New York City or the tri-state area at the time, you more than likely are familiar with Myls’s story already, or at least the awful headlines. Today’s video contains a lot of details of the torment and horror that a child was forced to live through. And while it hurts to have to describe these things, it’s absolutely critical that we tell the absolute truth and reality of what happened, because anytime a situation doesn’t seem as serious as it is, nobody takes it serious. And even when people know the situation is that serious, nothing is done about it.
It’s a story we’ve heard time and time again, and as of right now, there’s no sign that we’ll ever stop getting headlines like this. Needless to say, today’s video will not be easy to make it through. All I ask is that everybody please go in with caution. Viewer discretion is strongly advised.
“I’d like to discuss the problem of the battered child, or the battered child syndrome as it is sometimes called. This subject is extremely important to forensic pathologists because in many of these cases, the violence has been repetitive, and at some time the victim has been taken to the clinic and has been exposed to clinical observation. And the doctor does have a chance, if he is on the alert, to recognize the possibility that the explanation which is given by a parent or a guardian is hardly compatible with the extent of the injury. The explanation of the guardian or the parent of the infant that it fell from the sofa onto the floor, or that it kept falling down the stairs, is accepted as an explanation and nothing more is done about it.”
“Little Myls Dobson will never have a chance to grow up. The four-year-old died after being left in the care of a Midtown babysitter. Police sources say his body showed signs of abuse, including cigarette burns and bruises. Investigators were called to the babysitter’s apartment here at the Ritz Plaza building on West 48th Street Wednesday morning. Police sources say she initially told them she put Myls on the bathroom counter, briefly walked away, then heard a bang and found he had fallen into the empty tub. But it appears his death may not have been an accident.”
The footage you just saw was taken from the film The Battered Child, released to the public in 1969. The film details the harsh reality of battered child syndrome. Battered child syndrome is known as injuries sustained by babies and small children that have accumulated over time. The film details exactly how to spot if a small child has been enduring abuse and what physical signs to look out for, especially if you happen to be a doctor who sees this on a child, or a pathologist examining a child’s body after their passing—a practice that would be used for years and years to come.
The bruises, scars, and calluses on a child’s body all have one thing in common: they tell tragically similar tales of children who suffer through the unthinkable, and they wouldn’t make it out alive. If they do make it out alive after severe abuse, in many cases, chances are the child is in for many years of depression, low self-esteem, and different forms of PTSD. Sad to say that all these years later, very little has changed. If you turn on your evening news, chances are you won’t see any reports of children suffering, but the truth is it’s happening all around you.
When a child’s life is taken, the first thing everyone wants to know is who was responsible. A logical response, and as emotions run high, fingers can often be pointed as everyone tries to get answers. But as everyone is looking to the next person for those answers, the child in question—the most important part of it all—is already long gone. On today’s episode of Evil Intentions, this is Blame: The Story of Myls Dobson.
Four-year-old Myls Dobson was found starved, beaten, and burned on the bathroom floor of a luxury high-rise apartment in New York City because a system designed to protect neglected kids like him had failed.
Myls Dobson was born on April 7th, 2009, and resided in New York City. He was born to his mother, Ashley Dobson, and his father, a man by the name of Okee Wade. Like a lot of four-year-olds, Myls was vibrant, curious, and full of life—a child who left his kind impression on everyone he interacted with. He was described by loved ones as sweet, charismatic, and wise beyond his years. He was also trusting, and even if he just met you, he was always sweet and loving. Since he was born, the smile Myls was known for could light up a room.
According to interviews with Myls’s paternal grandmother, Myls lived with his mother in South Carolina for a few years after he was born. By all accounts, Myls was well looked after and had lots of love coming from both his mom and dad’s families. Whether it be Myls dressed up for the holidays looking as smooth as possible or at the beach with his mother, he looked to always be a very happy child. Those who knew the family also stated on numerous occasions that Myls was sweet and lively, always in the best of spirits as a kid should be. But as Myls continued to grow from a baby to a toddler, accusations of child abuse would begin.
On January 11th of 2011, ACS, or the Administration for Children’s Services, opened an investigation involving Myls and mother Ashley with allegations of “inadequate guidance.” The investigation was closed on January 25th, just two weeks later, because the claims couldn’t be substantiated. According to reports, in April of 2011, Ashley Dobson was arrested when after an emergency room visit with Myls led to a nurse calling the police. The nurse noticed lacerations on Myls. He was taken to the hospital when his grandmother noticed a mark near his ear and a part of his face was swollen.
Ashley and Myls had been staying at his grandmother’s home temporarily in Walterboro, South Carolina. Both Ashley and Myls’s grandmother were interviewed by the sheriff’s department. In a now-deleted video, Myls’s grandmother can be heard telling a sheriff’s deputy that Ashley soon planned to move to New Jersey. The Christmas before that took place, Ashley and Myls moved to Brooklyn so that Ashley and Myls’s father, Wade, could raise Myls together. The arrangement they had in mind didn’t work out though, and on one occasion, both Ashley and Myls had to be removed from the home after police were called for a domestic disturbance.
On the day that doctors called police, Myls’s grandmother would say that she met with Ashley and Myls, and when she saw him, she immediately asked Ashley what happened to him and where the injuries came from. She didn’t waste any time and she wanted to make sure that he was seen. Part of his injury stemmed from an incident caught on surveillance at a supermarket parking lot in South Carolina. His grandmother also stated that Ashley had been dealing with a great deal of mental issues and needed help getting through it. She wanted to take her own life in the past, so she began talking with the South Carolina Department of Disabilities and Special Needs, because even before she had Myls, she had moments where she would just black out. But at the time, she was told that since she wasn’t receiving any type of disability benefits, there was no funding to have people in her position receive the help they may need.
The incident caught on camera in that parking lot showed Ashley hitting Myls, and according to her, this took place when Myls ran into the path of speeding vehicles in the parking lot. She fully admitted to striking Myls right away because she was mad and scared of him almost getting run over by cars. She said she tried to catch him and fell on top of him. She then picked him up, and that’s when she hit him. It was also stated that Myls had a tumble down a set of stairs at some point after the incident in the parking lot. This happened when she called out his name while at a friend’s house, and he fell when running down, contributing to the outcome that day. At no point was Myls ever thought to be abused or disciplined in a harmful fashion, other than the incident at the parking lot. When an officer spoke to Myls and asked him questions after that incident, the child was still in good spirits; he smiled and answered questions as he drank apple juice.
A video uploaded by Myls’s aunt describes the situation: “Hello everyone, my name is [name], and I am the auntie of Myls Dobson. I just want to put this on YouTube, maybe there will be some people who will actually see this video and kind of get a better idea of, you know, who our family is and what actually happened. The media puts out a lot of things, and they only put out a part of the story. But my sister was not abusive to Myls, and Myls had a lot of love. We all loved him. Things happen, the system fails us, and the right information, you know, is never put out. And then they have this video of Ashley speaking with the police about a situation that happened. Well, Myls ran out into the middle of the road, and it scared her, and she grabbed him, and she hit him. She wasn’t trying to hit him in the face to hurt him, she was spanking him as in, ‘Don’t run out on the road, don’t do that, you know that’s bad. I told you not to run out in the road,’ spank. But it just so happened that she hit him. And then that day, he was playing and fell down the stairs. So it was just like something happened, and I’m not making light of any situation, but something happened and it turned into this huge, huge ordeal.”
By July of 2011, the abuse charges were dropped, and Ashley moved back to New York City with Myls. It was a chance to start new, and there were difficult challenges ahead. But through it all, the adorable Myls still had a smile on his face. When back in New York City, Myls was surrounded by loved ones. Despite the hard moments that the family experienced, Ashley was doing her best to be a better mother to Myls, controlling her temperament and trying to turn her life around.
But by August of 2011, ACS was accusing Ashley of child neglect, and Myls would be removed from the home. Ashley was still trying to get things together to turn her life around, and according to those close to her and Myls, she was not a neglectful mother. But things looked bad given the history, even if the history there wasn’t as straightforward as it seemed. Myls didn’t have a perfect upbringing, but he wasn’t a hated and neglected child. He was very much loved by those close to him, and the love came from both sides of the family.
“And I’m not making light of any situation, but something happened and it turned into this huge ordeal. And I think that people saw that one part of it, and they haven’t been able to see anything else or know anything else about Ashley. Ashley is the most loving person. She will give you the skin off of her body if you need it, and that’s how our family, our whole family is. You know, we are human and we do make mistakes, and there’s no perfect mother out there in this world. There’s no perfect mother. But my sister did not abuse my nephew.”
According to documents, Myls’s father had a prior history of arrests that included identity theft and accusations of violating a woman; he spent more than five months in prison. Despite this, in August of 2012, Myls’s father, Wade, was given full custody of his son, and he would be arrested just a month after. It’s believed that Ashley battling with mental health issues was used against her in court, making them lean toward giving Wade sole custody of Myls. There have been many situations just like this where that tactic is used to win in court. Ashley, still getting things in her life organized, was living in a shelter in Harlem at the time, and that’s mostly the reason for Myls’s removal, not abuse. A certain lifestyle can and will affect a small child one way or another.
And the arrests kept coming. When Wade was arrested just a month after getting custody of his son, Myls was now left without a primary guardian. So, he would have his ex-girlfriend care for Myls—an ex-girlfriend he had a very rocky relationship with, and it was said that Wade had put his hands on her. It got so serious that when his ex-girlfriend’s mother passed away, some of her last words were that Wade wasn’t allowed back in that home. But regardless, the address of his ex-girlfriend was the address he would give the judge when asked where he and Myls would be living now that he had full custody. It was also said by others who were interviewed that Myls was seen as an “anchor baby” since Wade would tie Myls to an address so that he always had somewhere to stay and collect public assistance for Myls.
Even with all this, after being monitored for a short time, any ACS case involving Myls was closed because they assumed his father had him now, and he was in safe hands despite his questionable past and alleged behavior. So basically, in some situations like this, a child is left with a parent and they just sort of hope that they end up okay. But that’s often not the case, and the child—the most important part of the entire equation—has no say and has no choice, oftentimes leaving the child with no protection.
Sometime in late 2013, Wade would start dating someone new, someone that he spoke very highly about. He introduced her to Myls and always spoke about her. Nobody knew it at the time, but this relationship would mark the beginning of the end for the now four-year-old Myls. According to reports, 2013 is when Wade began dating someone named Kryzie King, also known as Monroe, 27 years old. King was born Christopher King, later on in life transitioning to a woman. There was a 10-year age gap between King and Wade, with King being 27 years old and Wade being 37.
It was stated that nobody in Wade’s life was allowed to meet this new love interest, but this didn’t stop him from speaking highly of King. People close to the situation stated that Wade was always talking about King’s fancy apartment not far from Times Square. He often spoke about King’s body and his attraction. The relationship with this mysterious new person raised questions. Some wanted to know how King could afford such a fancy spot in an upscale neighborhood in a residential building where rent was upwards of $4,000 a month. Wade told some of the family that his new girlfriend was a former model who worked for Nike. He told others that she designed clothes and made videos that she would charge for. All that was really known was that the two met, and he really seemed to like King.
But there were also other pressing concerns, because in the short time Wade knew King, Wade spoke freely of all the nice things that King would do for Myls, like taking him to a Broadway show, buying him clothes and sneakers, and planning a trip to Miami for the Christmas season. Some of the family told Wade that he needed to be careful because he had only just met King and things seemed to be moving very fast. Many feel it’s wise to keep their children and their love life separate just until they know exactly who they’re dealing with and if the relationship is right for the child to be around. The trust that was put into King struck the family as odd, and they were very vocal about it. But Wade had sole custody of Myls; nobody else could say anything. And the concerns family members had when it came to the little boy would soon become a horrifying reality not even they saw coming.
On June 27th of 2013, Wade was one of 23 suspects arrested on fraud charges. Specifically, the charges stemmed from a scheme at a number of Atlantic City casinos in which more than $275,000 was stolen from people’s bank accounts. For this, he was granted bail and a court date for a hearing sometime later. Fast forward to the holiday season, December 19th of 2013, when Wade was arrested at his Brooklyn home because he violated the terms of his bail for his fraud arrest a few months prior. Again, this would leave Myls without his father.
Now, it’s very important to note that Myls had many family members available to care for him when Wade was locked up. Members from both sides of the family—immediate family who cared for Myls deeply and would have taken him in with open arms. But instead, on December 21st of 2013, Wade would make a call to King asking her to pick up Myls and be his caregiver. King would go to a family member’s home in Canarsie, Brooklyn, to pick up Myls, and this would mark the beginning of the end for the adorable four-year-old.
Myls was left with King, and nobody even knew about it. ACS, who monitored Wade when he got custody of Myls, didn’t even have any clue about Wade’s arrest. Had they been looking into things the way they should have, they would have known that Myls should have been sent to a family, not King, who had no relation to the child and didn’t even know his family. Regardless, Myls’s fate was sealed once he started staying with King at the Ritz Plaza on Manhattan’s 48th Street.
On January 8th of 2014, at around 10:50 a.m., just a week into the new year, a call was made to 911 concerning a small child who was unresponsive. The call was being made by King to her apartment. When officers arrived at the location, they’d find a limp and battered Myls slumped over in the bathtub. He wasn’t breathing, and he showed no signs of life.
He was immediately rushed to Roosevelt Hospital. When paramedics and doctors took a look at the condition of his body, they’d find that he was covered head to toe in bruises. He had cigarette burns on his body, and he was missing his front tooth. He also had several marks and abrasions all over his stomach and testicles. According to a CNN article, when asked how this happened to Myls, King stated that she left Myls on top of a ledge in the bathroom, and he was by himself when she went into the other room. A few seconds later, she heard a loud thud, and then she found Myls inside of the tub unresponsive, implying that Myls fell into the empty tub and that’s how he died.
The explanation made no sense and didn’t add up with what looked like weeks of torture. The suspicions authorities and doctors had were proven to be spot on, because after questioning at the Midtown North Precinct, King would go on to confess to what happened.
King stated that for weeks Myls was subjected to excruciating corporal punishment. Myls was beaten constantly, whipped with hangers, and beaten with belts, always making sure the metal buckle would strike Myls in his head. The reason for this was because he had been quote “acting up.” King, who was 5’10” and over 230 lbs, towered over Myls and inflicted endless amounts of pain on him. The punishments became much more brutal over the course of the next few short weeks.
King stated at any time Myls acted up, he would be thrown into the bathroom in the dark, left alone crying. On another occasion, King became so upset with Myls that his head was savagely slammed into the wall, which is why he had been missing a tooth. She burned Myls with cigarettes between his eyes and the rest of his body. He had a gash on his face from either being hit with a closed fist or a foreign object. King also wore oven mitts and took a scalding hot oven rack and placed it to Myls’s leg, severely burning him.
He was bound to a chair with shoelaces and gagged with a cloth so that neighbors wouldn’t hear his cries. King stated this was done to Myls because he spilled some perfume in the home. Myls was also slowly being starved, with his last full meal said to be on December 26th of 2013. The last time he ate anything at all was on January 3rd of 2014.
Lacerations were also found on Myls’s fingers, more than likely from him defending himself. Cuts were found on his armpit, and scars went across his small back. Myls was also beaten severely because he asked for McDonald’s because he was hungry. With all of these awful injuries, on January 7th of 2014, Myls, after being beaten, was thrown onto the 11th-floor balcony of King’s apartment in freezing temperatures.
According to weather reports, on that evening, New York City experienced below-freezing temperatures, with the wind chill making it feel much colder. Specifically, it was said that New York City was experiencing a polar vortex. Myls was left on that balcony for more than an hour, and he was only wearing shorts and a t-shirt. According to King, Myls was also severely beaten one time because he said that he felt alone in the world.
While Myls was left battered and burned, locked in the dark bathroom, King would carry on with everyday activities, making phone calls to friends and family as if a child wasn’t slowly dying in the home. On his last night with us, Myls’s body would begin to shut down from weeks of neglect, torture, and not being fed, losing around 25 lbs very rapidly. King would watch Myls as he began to lose consciousness and his eyes began to lose focus. Myls, the adorable four-year-old that was loved by so many, was dying. Still, King did nothing. She continued to watch him slip away.
It’s believed that Myls actually passed away on the 7th, meaning King waited to call the cops. King showed no emotion during the confession. The details of what Myls went through would send familiar feelings of shock across the city, with immediate comparisons to Nixzmary Brown, who went through similar horrors before her life was taken. For many, the awful news was too much to bear. When she identified Myls’s body, it was said that his mother, Ashley, screamed at the top of her lungs the entire time, distraught and inconsolable. She had visitation rights but stated that she hadn’t been allowed to see Myls since November of 2013. Seeing him in this battered state, lifeless, was the last thing she ever expected.
“Little Myls Dobson will never have a chance to grow up. The four-year-old died after being left in the care of a Midtown babysitter. Police sources say his body showed signs of abuse, including cigarette burns and bruises.” The boy’s uncle in Brooklyn did not want to show his face: “The way he died, he was defending himself.” “Investigators were called to the babysitter’s apartment here at the Ritz Plaza building on West 48th Street Wednesday morning. Police sources say she initially told them she put Myls on the bathroom counter, briefly walked away, then heard a bang and found he had fallen into the empty tub. But it appears his death may not have been an accident.”
“That was a tragic, tragic death of that young boy. Horrific injuries sustained over a period of days. Police today were questioning the babysitter at the Midtown North Precinct. Sources say she made statements claiming she had disciplined Myls for doing things he wasn’t supposed to do by hitting him with a coat hanger and her hands, and locking him in the bathroom.” “Really intelligent, really energetic, he was a sweet kid.” “Police sources tell us Myls was taken away from his mother because of neglect and given to his father, but he was arrested last month for bank fraud, leaving Myls in the sitter’s care. The uncle says the babysitter was the dad’s girlfriend who no one had met. The death left her neighbors stunned.” “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a four-year-old in this building.” “The Administration for Children’s Services is not permitted to say whether or not they have a history with this family. A spokesperson would only say they are actively investigating the tragic death of this little boy.”
“Four-year-old Myls Dobson was found starved, beaten, and burned on the bathroom floor of a luxury high-rise apartment in New York City. He died in part because a system designed to protect neglected kids like him had failed time and again. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio ordered a review of Dobson’s case and called for changes in hopes something like this never happens again.” “It’s very, very painful to know that this child went through such agony, and that a child was lost that we believe there were, you know, more than one opportunity to save. And we want to, going forward, learn from this tragedy and make changes as a result.”
“For most of his life, Dobson was moved from one caretaker to another. His mother, Ashley Dobson, lost custody of her son in 2011 for failing to care for him. She says she lost custody for financial reasons. Dobson was placed with his father, Okee Wade. Wade has an extensive criminal record. Over the period of a year, Children’s Services visited Dobson’s home nine times but never discovered Wade was in jail during each of those visits.” “Every time we went to visit, our workers went, we were told that the father was working and was working very long hours, 16 hours a day, and that’s why he wasn’t available. Should we have done something differently? Yes, we should have.” “Last month, police say Wade left his son in the care of 27-year-old Kryzie King. Wade was then arrested a few days later for bank fraud. He pleaded guilty and remains in jail. According to a criminal report, the final weeks of Dobson’s short life were filled with acts of neglect and violence at the hands of caretaker King. The criminal complaint says he suffered burns on his face, head, and body, and bruises consistent with being restrained. King is charged with first-degree assault and unlawful imprisonment and is being investigated on suspicion of murder. King’s attorney says his client is to be presumed innocent. Myls Dobson will be laid to rest in a family plot in his native South Carolina. Margaret Conley, CNN, New York.”
In the days following Myls’s passing, the news made its way to family, friends, and the rest of the city. While his physical torture had ended, even after his passing, Myls wasn’t yet at peace, as there was debate on who would claim the child’s body. Wade would make a plea with the judge to grant him temporary release so he could claim the child’s body and make funeral arrangements; he was denied that request. Ashley Dobson would tell reporters that she intended on claiming her child’s body, and Myls’s body was claimed a week later. His body was released by the city morgue to a Brooklyn funeral home so that arrangements could be made. A few days later, after initially seeing a judge, Wade was granted temporary release to attend a funeral for Myls, one that was still being arranged.
On Tuesday, January 21st of 2014, a funeral was held at the First Corinthian Baptist Church in Harlem, New York. Hundreds took to the streets of Harlem in the midst of a snowstorm to pay respects to Myls. The hearse carrying Myls’s body was supposed to be at the church by 5:00 p.m., but due to the snow, wouldn’t get there until more than 2 hours later. The service was short due to the delay, but a lot of emotions ran throughout the entire church as funeral workers opened Myls’s casket. Everybody in the church was visibly saddened at seeing him laying there dressed in a white suit with a matching white hat. His grandmother tried to approach the casket but quickly had to be assisted back to her seat as emotions took hold of her. Ashley Dobson and Okee Wade were also said to have been visibly distraught at the service as the horrible reality set in.
Reverend Al Sharpton gave a sermon at the service, blaming ACS for the negligence when it came to Myls’s care. In later interviews, Wade stated that he did his job as a father and that’s all that mattered. He also denied knowing Kryzie King and stated that he had no knowledge of who she was. He also said he didn’t know any details of Myls’s passing; he only knew of what he was told while he was in jail, finding out more of the awful details as time went on.
The aftermath of Myls’s death would raise many questions, mainly about how easy it was for a four-year-old to once again slip through the cracks. The same excuses you heard from Child Services in cases like Elisa Izquierdo, Dayquan Bennett, and Justina Morales are some we’ve heard before. Others say to stop blaming Child Services and blame the parents because it’s them who do this to their kids. But that goes without saying. It does not mean you get to accept a job where a child’s life might be at stake and treat it like you don’t care. Some of these situations slip under the radar because of huge workloads and agencies being understaffed, with workers becoming overwhelmed. But other times, there is clearly just a blatant disregard for these children.
It doesn’t matter what anyone says or where the blame is placed, these children aren’t here anymore. They suffered and they met tragic fates at the hands of monsters. And anyone who could have stepped in to prevent that and chose not to should forever be ashamed of themselves. Myls was a loved child. He had a wide selection of family who would have cared for him. He was taken from his mother because she was deemed unfit, but somehow placed in the care of someone who was also unfit. Clearly, decisions were made that allowed this to happen. The second that phone call was made to King, pretty much a stranger to this family, Myls didn’t stand a chance. Those three long weeks of torture that he endured could have easily been prevented if that phone call went to any one of Myls’s other loving family members, and if Child Services had actually been monitoring Myls’s situation.
The monster responsible for Myls’s death was King. It was King who dealt every vicious blow that ended his life. The big problem is how he ended up in that monster’s care. All the blame in the world would never bring Myls back or undo the horrors that he was forced to live through. All of the urgency coming from agencies and others when a story like this breaks is too little, too late, like always. And at this point, all I can bring myself to ask is: what child is going to be next? Rest in peace to Myls Dobson, and my deepest condolences go out to all of his family and loved ones. You aren’t forgotten.
“We were told that the father was working and was working very long hours, 16 hours a day, and that’s why he wasn’t available. Should we have done something differently? Yes, we should have.”
