The footage released as evidence in Gregor's trial is a shock to viewers at every turn.
The jury and prosecutor were shown footage of Gregor, who also has a history of drug use, repeatedly pushing his 6-year-old son Corey Micciolo on a treadmill, despite the boy repeatedly falling off. Even Gregor's defense attorney told the jury before playing the footage that they would be "horrified" and "embarrassed" by the video of the boy falling six times, yet he argued that the boy's death "had absolutely nothing to do with that treadmill"...
Christopher Gregor is charged with endangering the welfare of a child in a gym, as well as first-degree murder in the death of his son Corey Micciolo.
Prosecutors alleged that the boy told his mother some time before his death in 2021 that his father "made him run on the treadmill because he was fat." The coroner determined that the boy died from blunt force trauma, heart and liver contusion, acute inflammation and sepsis. The state later charged Gregor with murder after an autopsy report certified by a consulting physician found that the pattern, distribution and nature of the injuries were consistent with ongoing abuse and that the manner of death was homicide. Gregor has pleaded not guilty.
HORRIFYING IMAGES
On the first day of the trial, surveillance footage of the gym in Gregor's apartment complex from March 20, 2021 was shown; even the man's defense team acknowledged that this video would disturb and upset the jury.
The footage shows Gregor taking the boy to the gym after the boy's mother, Breanna Micciolo, dropped him off with his father. Once inside the gym, Corey gets on the treadmill while his father exercises on the other side of the room. Eventually Christopher comes up to the treadmill and starts to push it faster and faster, causing the boy to fall. Prosecutors believe that during this time, the man "appeared to bite" the boy's head as he put him back on the treadmill.
The boy falls a total of six times, each time Gregor picks him up and forces him to run again.
"I'm going to tell you right now, you're not going to like him and I don't care if you like him or not," defense attorney Mario Gallucci said in his opening statement Tuesday. You're going to be horrified, you're going to be embarrassed when you see this video, but I'm telling you right now, the evidence you're going to see about Corey's death has absolutely nothing to do with that treadmill."
THE MOMENTS HE TOOK HER TO THE HOSPITAL HALF UNCONSCIOUS
Prosecutor Jamie Schron claimed that following the gym incident in March 2021, both Corey's teacher and his mother Breanna began to "worry" about bruises on his body, which prompted the boy's mother to make an urgent application to the court for custody rights.
Schron said that when he visited the boy on April 1, 2021, he took him to a pediatrician, who sent him to a local hospital after seeing the bruises. Prosecutors claimed that the child was discharged later that evening and that he appeared to have "nothing wrong" with him. That same day, the mother, Breanna, learned that her custody application had been denied.
The next morning she brought Corey to his father and hours later he took him to the hospital in a semi-conscious state, where he was intubated, suffered two cardiac arrests and died. Prosecutor Schron said Christopher left the hospital, leaving Corey's side, before he was arrested two days later in Tennessee.
Referring to the autopsy, Schron said the boy died from blunt trauma and concluded: "Healthy six-year-olds don't die in just one working day, and neither does Corey Micciolo."
DEFENSE: HE WAS PREPARING FOR A SOCCER TRYOUT
"Our version of this evidence is nothing like the prosecution's," defense lawyer Mario Gallucci said in his opening statement, claiming that the boy was trying out for a flag football team at the time, during which time he did well in tryouts. He also claimed that the bruising that raised concerns was caused by the treadmill incident, as well as by playing soccer and "boys' activities".
Gallucci said he would present evidence that sepsis caused by infection was the likely cause of the boy's death and claimed that a CT scan performed after Corey's death showed the possibility of pneumonia. "No child should die, but this is not murder," Gallucci told the court, claiming that the mother, Brenna, was also using drugs and that this was one of the reasons she lost custody.
The court process continues.
