MERCER COUNTY, N.J. (1010 WINS) — A Ewing police officer who was charged with the murder of his infant daughter in 2018 was released from a county jail last month after a ruling ended in his favor last year regarding police seizing his cell phone which was later used as evidence, his attorney said.
The 33-year-old Mercer County officer, Daniel Bannister, is charged with murder and endangering the welfare of a child in the death of Hailey Bannister, his 3-month-old daughter.
Bannister had been in jail pending trial since he was arrested in the summer of 2019.
Following his daughter's death, Bannister was suspended from the Ewing police department where he served.
Catherine Bannister, Daniel Bannister’s wife, was also charged with reckless manslaughter and endangering in Hailey’s death but was released from jail shortly after her arrest. Catherine Bannister was a charter school teacher in Trenton though her state license was suspended in 2020 pending the case outcome.
According to the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office, Hailey died after a pattern of abuse, sustaining nine skull fractures, broken ribs and bleeding in her brain. Prosecutors suspect Daniel of being responsible for inflicting the injuries and Catherine with knowing and choosing not to report the injuries to police or doctors.
On Dec. 5, 2018, Hailey was taken to a Mercer County hospital by ambulance where detectives came a day later for an investigation after hospital staff reported her injuries. The infant died six days later at a New Brunswick hospital.
In May of 2019, the Middlesex County Medical Examiner’s Office ruled Hailey’s death a homicide occurring from blunt trauma impact to her head.
The couple’s cell phones were confiscated early on in the investigation and authorities obtained a warrant to look at the calls and texts stored on them. Investigators found “extensive” communications about Daniel allegedly abusing his daughter and used the information to charge the couple in July 2019.
Daniel’s attorney, Jeffrey G. Garrigan, said this past September, however, Mercer County Judge Darlene Pereksta suppressed the evidence collected from the cell phones after ruling the detectives did not have probable cause of criminality to get into the phones.
The decision has been appealed by the prosecutor’s office and oral arguments are set to begin in March.
The judge’s ruling, combined with other issues with the case raised by Bannister’s lawyer, initiated a revisiting of Bannister’s pretrial detention status, allowing him to be freed on Jan. 19 under level III monitoring, after two and a half years in jail in protective custody.
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