COWETA, Okla. — A Coweta man was sentenced to 16 years in prison for child abuse on Thursday.

25-year-old Axton Cole Chancellor was sentenced to 16 years in prison for one count of child abuse and one count of child neglect in Indian Country, the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma announced. The sentences on each count were ordered to run concurrently.

Chancellor pleaded guilty to the charges on July 5, 2022.

“According to investigators, over a three-day span in October of 2018, Chancellor willfully and maliciously harmed an infant entrusted to his care, then failed to seek medical treatment for the infant after inflicting severe injuries,” the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma announced. “The crime occurred in Wagoner County, within the boundaries of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation Reservation, in the Eastern District of Oklahoma.”

Kassidy Paige Sump, the child’s mother, is charged with child neglect and enabling child abuse.

In October of 2018, the Wagoner County Sheriff’s Office said Chancellor was arrested as well as the child’s mother who they said allowed the abuse to happen

The arrest came shortly after the infant ended up in Saint Francis Hospital.

Wagoner County Sheriff Chris Elliott said medical staff at Saint Francis soon realized the injuries were very abnormal.

Deputies were then notified that a five-and-a-half-month-old girl was transported by ambulance to the Saint Francis Hospital in Tulsa.

That’s where they began the investigation.

“This baby had injuries, what was told to us, was a fractured arm, fractured clavicle, possible skull fracture, had bruising on the face,” Elliot said. “I have looked at the x-rays and I will tell you, 30 years in law enforcement and I can positively tell you that this baby was assaulted violently.”

The baby, as well as another sibling, were taken into protective custody as the investigation continued.