Dallas Lawyer In Gernon Case: Alleged Kidnapper Is Schizophrenic

DALLAS, TX —New charges have been filed against Darriynn Brown, the 18-year old accused of burglary and kidnapping in the death last month of 4-year old Cash Gernon.

Those charges include injury to a child with intentional bodily injury. Additional charges could be filed pending the results of forensic studies.

In the meantime, Brown's attorney has gone on the offensive in trying to stem the tide of public condemnation against his client in the tyke's death.

For a start, Heath Harris, Brown's attorney, claims Brown is innocent of every charge currently lodged against him. That's despite a second kidnapping accusation of against Brown related to a February incident when Brown broke into the home of a 2-year old girl and had to be chased off by the infant's grandfather.

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Charges were pressed only after Cash Gernon's body was discovered on May 15 in the middle of a South Dallas street. The Gernon boy died of multiple stab wounds, according to authorities.

Harris also says his client is not the person shown in the video, and that Brown suffers from what his lawyer believes is schizophrenia. He also says that Brown had been seen at a mental health facility, but was not detained there.

Also new, according to Fox4 News, is that Monica Sherrod, the woman who may or may not have been Gernon's father's girlfriend, actually allowed Brown to stay at her place because "he was going through a mental crisis." That is the house where the Gernon twins were living when Brown allegedly snatched Cash in the early hours of May 15.

The other Gernon twin has since been reunited with his birth mother.

That created something of a domino effect, because when the 2-year old's grandfather learned of Brown's situation, he initially declined to report the incident. He did file charges, eventually — three days after Cash Gernon was killed.

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