Mountain Home man sentenced for child abuse

A Mountain Home man originally charged with felony child abuse was sentenced to a year in jail during a hearing Nov. 13.
Paul F. Carpentier III will actually spend less than two months in confinement after the judge suspended a majority of that jail time.
As part of the plea agreement that reduced the charge to a misdemeanor count of injury to a child, Carpentier will also spend two years on supervised probation. He was convicted of wilfully harming a three-year-old child during an incident Dec. 17, 2012.
According to the criminal complaint, he was at the home of a woman and her three children on East 16th North Street that evening. He was watching the children while she took care of errands, according to a report from the Mountain Home Police Department.
When the woman returned home that night and checked in on her children, she noticed that the three-year-old had several bruises on his face.
The police report alleges that Carpentier told the woman that he slammed the child into the bathroom floor and wall before he repeatedly struck the child in the face with his fists. He then beat the child's buttocks with a belt.
In light of the injuries, the child was seen at Elmore Medical Center following the alleged assault. The attending physician said the extent of injuries were not caused by a household accident or from another child, the police report added. In addition to the bruises, a mark consistent with a belt was discovered on the child's buttocks.
None of the children in the home were biologically related to Carpentier.
The reason for the alleged assault was never disclosed.