Bentley Robbins, an 8-year-old Georgia boy whose body was found in October 2019 in the woods near his Walker County home, died from blunt-force trauma days after a reported fall, according to investigators.
The autopsy findings were announced Friday during a news conference with Walker County Sheriff Steve Wilson and Georgia Bureau of Investigation special agents Steve Rogers and Joe Montgomery.
Montgomery said investigators learned Bentley had been playing alone either on Sept. 30 or Oct. 1 when he fell on a rock near his home, hitting his head and causing a brain bleed.
The next day, Bentley told multiple people about the fall and he had marks on his face. He was treated for minor injuries both at home and school. The boy had symptoms similar to the flu or an illness after the fall that "masked" what was happening to his brain, Rogers said.
Bentley told a school nurse on Oct. 2 that he had fallen and hit his head. When he told his mom the same story, and after he was feeling sick, Bentley and his mother went to a hospital to get checked out, Rogers said.
Bentley started to feel better on the way to the hospital, Rogers said, and when the two arrived there the emergency waiting room was full. Instead of waiting, Bentley and his mother returned home.
Rogers said he doesn't know if the hospital could have done anything that night to help Bentley because he was experiencing flu-like symptoms, and it's unlikely the hospital would have performed a CT or MRI scan.
Rogers said multiple children were sick at Bentley's school, Chattanooga Valley Elementary, and at home at the same time Bentley started to feel ill.
The next day, on Oct. 3, Bentley got to school and almost immediately became violently ill and started to throw up. He was dismissed from school at about 10 a.m., records show.
Wilson said Bentley started to feel better again once he got home and was able to play.
His mother, her boyfriend and another child left the home to go to a sporting event and left him with another caregiver. The caregiver went to go to a grocery store and thought Bentley had gone with everyone else to the sporting event, Rogers said. That's why the child was left alone for about 30 minutes the night he was found dead.
Montgomery said Bentley likely walked to the woods, lay down, fell asleep and died as a result of his brain injury.
Rogers said no charges are expected to be filed in the case.
Contact Patrick Filbin at pfilbin@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6476.