By Janice Morse The Cincinnati Enquirer
and David Eck Enquirer contributor

Justin A. Johnson Jr.

MADISON TWP. - Hours after firefighters and neighbors tried desperately to save 7-month-old Justin A. Johnson Jr. from a fire that consumed his home early Wednesday, police charged the child's mother with causing his death.

Aimee Leonard, 29, is expected to appear in Middletown Municipal Court today on felony charges of involuntary manslaughter and child endangering. She was being held in the Middletown city jail.

"It's so sad just to see a joyful little cheerful kid die. ... It's the only little kid I've ever had," the baby's father, Justin A. Johnson Sr., 30, said in a telephone interview from his Middletown home. "I guess it hasn't really sunk in yet that he's gone."

Johnson said the tragedy is all the more difficult to handle because he was trying to get custody of his son - an issue that was to have been addressed in court March 8.

Butler County Sheriff's Lt. Mike Craft said additional charges against Leonard are possible because investigators believe she caused the fire that killed Justin.

"I've charged her with what the facts will allow me to charge her with," Craft said, stressing that the investigation of the baby's death is still in its very early stages.

Coroner Richard P. Burkhardt said preliminary findings showed the death was fire-related. Blood tests revealed Justin's carbon monoxide levels had reached 90 percent - well above the fatal reading of 50 percent, Burkhardt said. "There's no question it's a carbon-monoxide death," he said.

Craft said he couldn't answer whether Leonard intended to kill the baby or whether she simply panicked after the fire started.

But he did say investigators believe she "ignited a piece of clothing" after an unpleasant telephone conversation with Justin's father late Tuesday or early Wednesday.

Craft alleges Leonard threw the flaming material on the kitchen floor of her trailer in the Catalina Manufactured Home Community here. The fire spread quickly from the kitchen as the child slept in his crib two rooms away.

The county 911 center began receiving reports of the blaze around 12:40 a.m. Wednesday.

Upon arrival, Madison Township firefighters found flames shooting from the structure. Crews tried several times to rescue the baby.

"The mother had told us approximately where the baby was," Madison Township Fire Chief Kent Hall said. "We sent two crews in (and) did what we could."

Scott Wells, who lives next door, was awakened by Leonard pounding on his door.

"Aimee was screaming her baby was inside and (the home) was on fire," Wells said.

As Wells' daughter called 911, he said, he tried to get into the trailer before firefighters arrived. Wells broke through the door but could not reach the baby. "I tried to get in there," he said. "We had the back door busted out."

Firefighters eventually pulled Justin from a rear window, but it was too late. Coroner's Chief Investigator Patricia Randolph pronounced him dead at the scene.

Investigators from the Ohio State Fire Marshal's office and the Middletown Fire Department spent much of Wednesday searching the burned-out home. At one point, a fire dog went inside the trailer, then sniffed clothes, toys and other items piled up outside.

Neighbors said a friend of Leonard owned the trailer and lived there with her and the baby.

Fire officials will make counselors available for firefighters.

Col. Richard K. Jones, the Butler sheriff's chief deputy, said one corrections officer in his 20s who also serves the Madison fire department, confided how upset he was about the baby's death.

"He said he had never seen anything like this in his life," Jones said. "I hope he never does again - but the cruel reality is that he will."

E-mail jmorse@enquirer.com