Boy Shaken as Baby Dies 12 Years Later

A 12-year-old boy who was shaken as a baby and remained in a vegetative state for the rest of his life has died, authorities said Wednesday. Aiden Stein died Sunday at a Columbus hospital. The case drew national attention when his parents waged a successful legal fight to prevent a court-appointed guardian from having him removed from life support. Three doctors had testified that Aiden would never recover. The Ohio Supreme Court eventually ruled that a probate court lacked the authority to allow a guardian to stop the care keeping Aiden alive when his parents hadn't permanently lost their parenting rights.

Four-month-old Aiden was rushed to a Mansfield hospital in March 2004 after his father, 21-year-old Matthew Stein, reported the baby had lost consciousness. Stein was later convicted of felonious assault and child endangerment and spent eight years in prison despite his assertions that he never injured his son. Richland County Prosecutor Bambi Couch Page told the AP on Wednesday that it was "unlikely" she'd pursue further charges against Stein. "I would have to look at the reason (Aiden) died," Couch Page said. "But there would probably be a stretch in jurors' minds that he died as the result of what the dad did." It's unclear if a cause of death has been determined. Click for more of Aiden's story. (More child death stories.)