Most folks in Sanford knew of Lyiah Davis' arrival in January 1999. She was the first baby of the year, and the local paper captured her picture for the front page. Her parents and a great-aunt beam for the photographer; Lyiah is bundled in a blanket, cradled by her mother.

Five months later, Lyiah's obituary ran on Page 12 of the newspaper. Her father, Louis Lee Davis, had shaken the life out of her, jerking her back and forth so hard that her brain sloshed against her skull like paint in a can.

Davis spent one year and 11 months behind bars for her death; he had served a longer sentence years before for a break-in and theft.

Lyiah was one of 44 children who died from violent shaking in North Carolina from 1999 through 2003, according to state medical records. That's one third of all children who died from abuse during this period.

Vigorously shaking an infant can cause a range of brain injuries known as shaken baby syndrome. To inflict such damage, the American Society of Pediatrics says, the shaking is so forceful "that individuals observing it would recognize it as dangerous and likely to kill the child."

Despite the violence, most baby shakers in North Carolina, like Lyiah's father, are lightly punished, if at all.

Only two people went to prison for life in the shaken baby deaths from 1999 through 2003. Judges sent 21 others to prison, but more than half of those drew sentences of less than 10 years.

And for the deaths of 18 children, no one went to prison at all. That includes 10 deaths in which no one was charged.

Some examples:

* A Guilford County prosecutor agreed to five years' probation for Rosy Cruz-Sandoval after she admitted shaking her 1-month-old son, Andra, to death in May 2000. As part of her community service, Cruz-Sandoval translated for Spanish-speaking mothers in the maternity ward of a local hospital.

* In Onslow County, Antwan Teagle told prosecutors that he shook his 9-month-old stepdaughter, Destinee, while playing with her in April 2001. Her sister, Sincere, also showed signs of having been shaken. In January 2004, Teagle pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and felony child abuse and will spend a little less than six years in prison.

* In Gaston County, Penny Nye escaped jail time by pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter for shaking her 5-month-old son, Dustin, in 1999. After the shaking, Nye and Dustin went shopping at a Dollar General. An off-duty nurse looked in Nye's buggy and noticed Dustin wasn't breathing.

The state's courts and prosecutors are not as lenient when it comes to adult victims of violence in the home. Of 35 people convicted of killing adults in domestic violence incidents in 2002, 18 -- more than half -- went to prison for life. Only four were sentenced to fewer than 10 years in prison.

Prosecutors and law enforcement explain the disparity in part by the nature of shaken baby deaths.

They say juries don't want to believe anyone would harm a baby. Evidence can be hard to come by: There are no weapons to dust for fingerprints, no blood to send to a crime lab. Rarely is there an eyewitness. And sometimes investigators can't pin down exactly when a shaking occurred, making it hard to identify a suspect.

Some prosecutors and police say North Carolina should consider a new law that would specifically address child abuse deaths.

At least 21 other states have adopted laws that treat child abuse deaths separately from other homicides. But North Carolina's attorney general and the Conference of District Attorneys, the state group representing prosecutors, resist the idea, saying the state's current laws should work.

The prosecutor who handled Davis' case is not so sure. Marci Trageser, an assistant district attorney in Lee County, says if the laws had been tougher, Davis could have gotten more prison time.

After his release in the spring of 2001, Davis fathered two boys.

Both were shaken so badly doctors doubt they'll ever fully recover. Davis is back in prison for abusing one of those sons.

Loss of control

Lyiah Davis' mother, Sabrina Sanders, worked the dinner shift at a restaurant in Durham the night her daughter was shaken. She left 5-month-old Lyiah and another daughter, 18 months old, with Louis Lee Davis.

Davis later told investigators that he had settled in front of the TV to watch the Utah Jazz and Portland Trail Blazers play basketball. About 9 p.m., Lyiah started getting fussy, so he gave her a bottle and tucked her into his double bed. Just before 11 p.m., he said, he poked his head in the room to check on her. She wasn't breathing. He ran to a neighbor's house and called for help.

By the time paramedics arrived, Lyiah lay lifeless on the bed. For 10 minutes, they tried to revive her. They hooked her to a ventilator and rushed her to Central Carolina Hospital. Doctors declared her dead that night.

An autopsy showed a dozen healing rib fractures, evidence that Lyiah had been abused before.

Trageser, the prosecutor, said Davis took the blame for Lyiah's death at a hearing in April 2000. Davis, then 25, told a judge he had lost control while baby-sitting, Trageser recalled. She agreed to let Davis plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter, an unlawful killing without malice or intent.

Davis had spent nearly a year in the Lee County jail awaiting trial. After his plea, he was out of prison in little more than a year.

Trageser said she bargained because she feared a jury would not convict Davis of murder.

"We didn't feel that we had the mom in our corner, and I didn't feel comfortable going into the courtroom not knowing what she'd say," she said. "Knowing what I know now, I would have risked it."

After Davis finished his prison sentence, Lyiah's mother, Sanders, welcomed him back, said Davis' aunt, Charline McLean. The couple moved to Harnett County for a fresh start, McLean said, and they had a baby boy, Trey, in January 2002.

Sanders couldn't be reached. Letters left at her listed addresses in Raleigh went unanswered.

In March 2002, Sanders rushed Trey, then 6 weeks, to WakeMed in Raleigh after he had a seizure. Doctors diagnosed shaken baby syndrome, Harnett County Sheriff Larry Rollins said. That night, social workers snapped pictures of the gaunt infant strapped to a maze of tubes and wires.

Detectives immediately suspected Davis of shaking Trey, Rollins said. But they couldn't rule out two other adults. Sanders and a cousin also had access to Trey during the time doctors think he was abused. Sanders and the cousin passed lie detector tests, Rollins said. Davis refused to take one.

"All clues pointed to him, but you can't go to court on a gut feeling," Rollins said.

Harnett County Social Services put Trey in foster care after the shaking. A judge later terminated Davis' and Sanders' parental rights.

Cycle of abuse

In spring 2002, Davis met Lydia Quick in the checkout line of a Food Lion in Sanford. She was having a rough day, and he made her laugh, said Quick, 27, who now lives in Lumberton. Davis had split from Sanders by then, Quick said.

Davis and Quick set up house on a rural highway outside Sanford. In March 2004, she gave birth to a son, Jordan.

Two months later, she left Jordan with Davis while she updated her resume at the county employment office. Later that night, as she tried to feed the baby a bottle, he wailed and arched his back. His arm and leg started jerking. Quick called her pediatrician, who urged her to take Jordan to UNC Hospitals.

Doctors concluded that someone had shaken Jordan, and not for the first time. A brain scan showed he had been shaken before, Quick said.

She knew Davis had been to prison for Lyiah's death, but he swore he had not been the one who shook her, Quick said.

Quick had never heard of Davis' son Trey until the night she went to the emergency room with Jordan. Now, Quick said, she feels like a fool.

"I felt like everyone [at the hospital] was whispering and looking at me," she said. "It wasn't until later that I understood why. They knew the name Lee Davis."

Trageser remembers the moment a detective called to tell her about Jordan.

It was late; she had on her pajamas. When she heard Davis' name, she sank into a chair.

"I just didn't want to believe that he could do it again," she said.

In November, Davis pleaded guilty to felony child abuse for shaking Jordan. He'll be in prison until at least 2008.

Davis did not reply to several letters requesting an interview. His attorney, Nicolle Thair of Sanford, said Davis was abused as a child.

"It's a cycle, and you have to address the problem at its root," said Thair, who added that Davis deserves credit for taking responsibility for Jordan's injuries.

Law 'made for adults'

A special law to address child abuse deaths would make it easier to punish baby-shakers, some prosecutors and police investigators said. They would not need to prove malice, premeditation and deliberation -- elements usually required for a first-degree murder conviction. They would have to prove only that a defendant violently shook a baby, and as a result, the child died.

Trageser wishes such a law had been in effect when she prosecuted Davis for killing Lyiah.

"The law just wasn't on our side, the way it is written," she said.

Child homicide laws in other states carry lengthy prison terms. In California, an adult who fatally assaults a child younger than age 8 must serve 25 years to life in prison. In Mississippi, fatal abuse of a child is punishable by execution.

In North Carolina, prosecutors and juries often settle for a conviction of involuntary manslaughter, the lowest-level homicide charge available. That's what happened in 11 of the 27 deaths from 1999 through 2003 that yielded convictions. It is a less severe felony than child abuse. Someone convicted of abusing a child could get a stiffer prison sentence than someone convicted of killing a child.

"These elements in these charges are made for adults," said Greensboro Police Detective Alan McHenry, who has handled several shaken baby fatalities. "Nothing is catered toward children. Most people that shake don't mean to kill the child, but they should have known better. We've got to have something else in our arsenal. Someone's got to take responsibility for these deaths."

Officials with the N.C. Child Advocacy Institute, a private nonprofit group in Raleigh, asked for a child homicide law last winter. But they backed off after the state Attorney General's Office and the N.C. Conference of District Attorneys said it was unnecessary. There's already a way to severely punish child killers, they said.

Prosecutors can pursue first-degree murder convictions in child abuse deaths by using the felony murder rule. Under this rule, a jury can convict a defendant of first-degree murder if he committed a felony and someone died as a result.

The state Supreme Court upheld a first-degree murder conviction under the felony murder rule in 1997 for a child abuse death. But of the 44 shaken baby fatalities, only two prosecutors used the felony murder rule to obtain murder convictions.

In both cases, prosecutors had strong evidence and compelling witnesses, rarities in shaken baby fatalities.

The Attorney General's Office and the Conference of District Attorneys acknowledge they are not seeing the results they'd like in child abuse deaths. But rather than seek a new law, they want to push prosecutors to use the felony murder rule.

The N.C. Child Advocacy Institute hasn't given up on the idea of a new law. It vows to monitor child abuse homicides over the next few years and see whether prosecution improves.

"Creating a new law brings with it a certain force that begins to move a culture," said Tom Vitaglione, senior fellow at the institute. "But we're still hoping the current system can work better."

Abuse's aftermath

There's no trace of Lyiah Davis in the patch of earth where she is buried. Weeds as high as tombstones camouflage the markers in the isolated Sanford cemetery.

Knotts Funeral Home of Sanford says it put a metal plate with Lyiah's name on it by her gravesite, but someone must have yanked it out to mow. The family never put down a permanent marker.

Lyiah's brother Trey, now 3, lives with his adoptive mother in Wake County. At first, he was so clumsy that he ran into walls. He threw tantrums. He is tiny for his age, and doctors suspect he will face learning disabilities.

But his adoptive mother, a pediatric therapist, works with Trey for hours each day. At age 2, he uttered his first word: Mommy.

Jordan Davis, now 18 months old, is settling into a new life with an aunt and uncle in Staunton, Va.

Doctors tell his aunt, Kelly Kravitz, that he will likely spend his school days in special education classes. He lost his sight for a while, but it is back now, a relief for the family. Physical therapists work with him every week, and he finally is walking. He takes seizure medicine three times a day.

Jordan's mother, Lydia Quick, has nightmares that someone is shaking her so hard she can't breathe. She thinks it's payback for leaving Jordan with his father.

Louis Lee Davis bides his time at the Hoke Correctional Institution in Raeford.

After he was convicted in 2004 of abusing Jordan, the judge recommended that he enroll in anger management classes in prison. Davis took a two-day course, a Department of Correction spokeswoman said, but he has not signed up for a more extensive class.

Davis' family tries not to dwell on the past, said his aunt, Charline McLean.

"It's just like it's blown over now," she said. "Nobody talks about it."

(News researchers David Raynor and Lamara Williams-Hackett contributed to this report.)