Warrant: Father Took Out Life Insurance Policies Before Tot's Death

A Manassas City father charged with first-degree murder for the drowning death of his young son took out life insurance policies on the boy—and falsely claimed the tot's mother was dead, according to court documents filed by a Manassas City Police detective. 

Joaquin Shadow Rams, 40, of Landgreen Street in the City of Manassas, is . In an affidavit for a search warrant filed in Prince William County Circuit Court on Jan. 25, police said that their investigation had produced conflicting accounts of the boy's death, and that the toddler did not have a seizure as Rams claimed. 

Rams had court-ordered visitation with his son for two Saturdays a month. Prince died during one of the first few visits. Rams told police that he put the child in his crib, and sometime later, heard rasping noises. 

"Rams told police that he suspected [Prince] was having a seizure," the warrant signed by Detective M.L. Merritt states. "Rams told police that he picked [Prince] up from his crib, carried him to the bathtub, removed his clothing and diaper, and put water on him. Thereafter, rescue was called to the scene."

Household members gave different accounts, the warrant claims. One person said that he saw Prince on his back in the bathtub that was filled with two to three inches of water. He told police he saw Rams throwing water onto Prince. 

Officers charged Rams with first-degree murder Jan. 25. The Medical Examiner has concluded that Prince died by drowning, and did not have a seizure that day (though Prince did have a history of seizures, the Washington Post has reported). The boy died the next day at a hospital. 

The police investigation also showed that Rams had taken out several life insurance policies on his son. On one policy, it states that Prince's mother, Hera McLeod, died in an accident at age 27. She is still alive—and writes a blog about Rams and her son's death.

"Prince only survived three visits before on the fourth visit coming home brain dead and cold. Every single time I said goodbye to my son before handing him over to Luc, my gut would scream bloody hell. My instincts at this time told me to run," McLeod wrote in a recent post on the blog, Cappuccino Queen. 

Before his arrest, Rams started his own blog, King Latte. "I am very devastated at not only the loss of my son, Prince, but also by the way I am being characterized as a demon, psychopath or murderer by the media and in the myriad of blogs who have done nothing but speculate, without knowing any of the facts," he wrote in the most recent post.