head trauma Addryana suffered from being shaken with great force, the Commonwealth introduced evidence of Dant's prior abuse of Addryana through the testimony of his and April's coworkers, LeDeanna Taylor and Cindy Goatee. Both women testified that approximately three days before Addryana's death, while April and Dant were arguing with each other at work, they heard April tell Dant that he was the one who "puts Addryana in the corner and smacks her on the head when she does not mind him." Dant did not deny this accusation, but rather, replied that he was tired of working forty hours a week to support "a kid" that did not belong to him. Furthermore, through the testimony of Dant's former girlfriend, Hannah Hall, with whom Dant lived in August 2003,the jury learned that when Dant's own daughter, Katilyn, was approximately six months old, he would hold her in a corner and push her face against the wall when she cried. Hall testified that Dant also would wrap Katilyn in a blanket so tight that she would be unable to move, smack her bottom when she cried, blow in her face, and shake her to make her stop crying. Hall also stated that Dant physically abused her sixteen-month-old son, Isaac, revealing that on one occasion when Isaac was crying, Dant hit Isaac in the face so many times he left fingerprints and bruising.
Following the Commonwealth's case-in-chief, Dant called as witnesses his and April's former roommates, all of whom testified that although they never saw Dant abuse Addryana, Dant