AMARILLO -- Julian Herring died on January 10th in Hobbs, New Mexico. Now his stepmother Contessa Herring is in custody and is being charged with abandonment or abuse of a child resulting in death. His family had moved to Hobbs from Amarillo in October 2007. A closer look into the family's history revealed there were three CPS cases in Amarillo that were opened and closed. The first was in October of 2006 when the baby-sitter Annie Jones, called CPS when she said the family had put alcohol in Julian's sippy cup. CPS conducted an investigation and found no evidence and closed the case. Then in March 2007 Jones called CPS again for neglectful supervision after Julian had gotten a black eye. CPS conducted an investigation again and took statements from both parents that Julian had fallen and hit his eye on a coffee table. In July 2007 someone else reported inappropriate discipline to CPS and they opened another investigation. CPS could not find the family and finally met up with them in October 2007 when they were moving to Hobbs they then three months later conducted an investigation and evaluated the children. They confirmed that there was no physical evidence of abuse and closed the case. Soon after the Herring family moved to Hobbs. On November 28th according to Hobbs Police Department Captain Donnie Graham they were called to the Herring's house on a possible child abuse incident. The police and The Child and Youth and Families Division took statements from family members that the bruises on Julian were from him repeatedly falling off his bike. Then on January 10th the call of Julian's untimely death was reported. Police arrived to the Herring's house and according to the incident report and criminal complaint Julian was dead and had bruises around his ear and blood in his mouth. After police questioned Contessa Herring she gave several different accounts of how he sustained the injuries until finally she admitted to hitting him with her closed fist. The criminal complaint of Contessa's statement reads: "She sat up on the bed, straddled him, placing his knees between hers and she hit him in the side of his head with her closed fist."