A New Hampshire mother fervently denied to investigators doing anything to hurt her missing 5-year-old son. Or as she put it, “We did not hurt that f—ing little boy and I do not appreciate you saying that we did.”
This was on Oct. 18, 2021, the day after law enforcement arrested Danielle Dauphinais, 38, and her boyfriend, Joseph Stapf, 34, in a Bronx subway station in New York and several days before Elijah Lewis, 5, was found dead in a park in Abington, Massachusetts.
Dauphinais insisted to authorities that she and Stapf had nothing to do with hurting the then-missing Elijah. Nonetheless, she ended up pleading guilty to second-degree murder — down from first-degree as charged — and two counts of tampering with a witness; she is serving a sentence of 53 1/2 years to life. Stapf pleaded guilty to manslaughter and is serving up to 45 years behind bars.
In a text to a friend, Dauphinais previously voiced frustration with the young child’s behavior, comparing him to serial killers Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer. But loved ones in court described him in glowing terms, and the judge acknowledged the 5-year-old had an obvious “zest for life.”
Relatives of 5-y-o Elijah Lewis in front row with #ElijahLewisStrong signs, as boyfriend of Merrimack, NH boy whose body was discovered in Abington, MA last year, is now pleading guilty to manslaughter & other charges. “We want to be Elijah’s voice.”#wbz pic.twitter.com/aZDCZtcPC3
— Christina Hager (@ChristinaHagerD) September 29, 2022
In the interrogation footage from 2021, Dauphinais was emphatic that she was innocent of hurting the child, and maintained she had no clue about what happened to him. She agreed when an investigator suggested Elijah was likely dead, however.
But prosecutors produced text messages showing that she and Stapf discussed abusing Elijah and not feeding him, though it was Stapf who pleaded with Dauphinais that they had to feed him and let him sleep so he would look better and they could take him out. Finally he found the child naked and bleeding from the head in a bathtub, and Elijah died some time between Sept. 21 and 24, authorities said.
Dauphinais recruited Stapf to help get rid of the body. They drove a pickup truck to Abington, where they buried Elijah in a shallow grave, prosecutors said.
“We didn’t do anything,” she said in Oct. 18, 2021. “There’s no body!”