A central Minnesota man has admitted that he shook and inflicted severe brain injuries to his baby girl at the family’s home.

Andrew D. Erickson, 28, of Garrison, pleaded guilty Wednesday in Crow Wing County District Court to first-degree assault in connection with violent actions toward daughter Gracie Erickson on Fourth of July weekend in 2022, when she was 3 ¹⁄₂ months old.

Two days later at a Minneapolis hospital, Erickson told a sheriff’s investigator that he dropped Gracie, the criminal complaint read. When pressed further, he said he may have shaken the girl five or six times before dropping her. He then put the count at closer to nine of 10 times, the complaint continued.

Despite prosecutors saying in their complaint less than a week after the assault that it was “unlikely that [Gracie] will survive the injuries,” the girl did pull through and is now 1 ¹⁄₂ years old.

According to the complaint:

A sheriff’s deputy arrived about 9:30 p.m. on July 3, 2022, after a report of a baby having trouble breathing. Gracie was admitted to Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis, where a nurse said her injuries were not consistent with Erickson’s contention that the child fell during a diaper change.

The baby’s mother, Gabrielle Palacio, told a sheriff’s investigator that she and her two sisters spent July 3 swimming and relaxing before they went to Brainerd to socialize. Erickson was left to look after Gracie and her two siblings, one of the sister’s children and another child the sister was looking after.

Erickson called Palacio that night, she said, and said Gracie was “breathing funny and acting weird.” Palacio arrived home as her daughter was being put in an ambulance.

Medical examination found that Gracie had extensive brain damage and various other injuries to her spine.