Blair County Judge Timothy M. Sullivan eight months ago ruled that an Altoona couple had physically abused their newborn child.

His decision led to placement of the 6-week-old boy with the county’s child welfare agency and eventually into a foster home.

The mother of the child, according to Sullivan’s ruling, did not participate in the physical abuse but was declared a child abuse perpetrator “by omission,” meaning she should have realized what was happening to the baby and taken action.

Through her attorney, Traci L. Naugle, the mother appealed Sullivan’s opinion to the Superior Court and late last week a three-judge panel, in an unusual move, adopted Sullivan’s 30-page opinion as its own.

“We conclude that Judge Sullivan’s thorough, well-reasoned opinion properly disposes of the issues raised by the mother,” according to Judges John T. Bender, Mary Jane Bowes and Carl A. Solano.

The Superior Court decision was the third in the last three weeks upholding opinions by Sullivan and Blair County Judge Wade A. Kagarise concerning cases under Blair County Children, Youth and Families.

The mother, who was referred to only by her initials in the two court rulings, challenged Sullivan’s conclusions, contending she did not know the abuse by the father was occurring.

She pointed out that during the weeks that abuse occurred, she took the child for medical checkups where the abuse was discovered.

Dr. Joseph Castel, a pediatrician at Nason Hospital in Roaring Spring, determined the child was suffering from rib fractures, both recent and in various stages of healing, as well as an injury to the area between the child’s front teeth.

Dr. Jennifer Clarke, a pediatrician who specializes in child abuse at Children’s Hospital in Pittsburgh, not only confirmed Castel’s findings but found additional fractures to the child’s legs and a laceration to the child’s liver.

Both physicians attributed the injuries to child physical abuse and dismissed the father’s possible explanations as to how the injuries occurred.

The father said the baby had fallen from a couch and on another occasion had slipped through his arms and he caught the child around the chest. The father attributed the mouth injury to the fact that he had used force to place a bottle in the child’s mouth.

He also stated that he used his hand to loosen mucus in the child’s chest and heard a “pop.”

During a hearing in the case before Sullivan, Clarke testified that laceration to the liver was the result of “blunt force trauma to the belly.”

Sullivan wrote, “Dr. Clarke testified that punching or other unilateral forces typically cannot cause this type of injury — instead, the force is applied as stomping or another really significant force where the child is on a hard surface.”

The judge concluded the baby would have experienced significant pain that should have been noticed by the mother, who served as the child’s main caretaker during the first months of his life.

“The court finds that (the mother) is a perpetrator for failing to act when (the child) suffered the injuries,” he stated.

While the injuries were painful to the child, they were not, according to the medical testimony, life-threatening, Sullivan stated.

The doctors said the child’s injuries are “healing well” and the youngster is experiencing no “developmental delays,” he related.

For these reasons the judge rejected a request by Children, Youth and Families to find “aggravated circumstances” against both mother and father.

Altoona police brought multiple criminal charges against the father, who is awaiting trial.

When the father was arrested, Altoona Detective Nichole Douglas described the injuries to the child as “near fatal.”