By
MICHAEL AMSEL
Gannett News Service
TOMS RIVER
How did a beautiful teenage girl who had dreams of becoming a dancer end up being charged with the murder of her infant son?
Those were the questions friends of Jessica Morgan were asking themselves last week in the wake of the news that she and her boyfriend have been arrested on charges they beat their infant son to death and burned his body in the fireplace of their Burlington City home.
Morgan, 20, and her boyfriend, Kevin Abrahams, 25, were arrested on a drug possession offense by the sheriff's officers in Kissimmee, Fla., July 16 and charged with the murder Friday, said Burlington County Prosecutor Robert D. Bernardi.
As a student at Toms River High School South, Morgan was a " nice, sweet girl" who did well in school and studied dancing at the Dance Centre in South Toms River, friends say. But she became enthralled with Abrahams - whose criminal past includes a charge of assault on another woman in 1998 - and began a dizzying descent into drugs and, allegedly, murder.
"Everyone who knows her will tell you she came under the influence of that guy (Abrahams), and that was the beginning of the end for her," said Mary Ragucci, owner of the All That Hair salon in the Bayville section of Berkeley.
Morgan's mother, Donna, who lives in Berkeley, used to work at the hair salon, Ragucci said.
It was the baby's maternal grandmother who helped open the investigation that led to the arrest of her daughter and boyfriend, Bernardi said. She was worried because she had not seen her grandson in two months.
Donna Morgan became suspicious soon after the couple's hard-partying lifestyle got them thrown out of the friend's home where they had been staying in Burlington City, and she called police, Bernardi said.
Donna Morgan could not be reached for comment.
"I saw Donna about a month ago at National Check Cashing ( in Beachwood), and she said she didn't like this guy from day one - even before the baby was born," Ragucci said. " She said he was nothing but trouble."
Dover Township Police Chief Michael G. Mastronardy said Abrahams was arrested on June 2, 1998, for assaulting a 20- year-old woman who was then his girlfriend.
According to a police report on the incident, Abrahams punched the woman and bit her in the face. He also dragged her into a bedroom and threw her on the bed. When police arrived, Abrahams said: "I'm guilty. I choked her last night," the report said.
Katie Jonin of Pine Beach, a friend of Jessica Morgan, used to see her taking dance lessons at the Dance Centre and was "totally shocked" when she saw news of the arrest Friday.
"She just loved tap and jazz dancing," Jonin said. "She was very good at it, too. She had so much going for her ... before she hooked up with that guy."
"I did her hair before all her big dance events," Ragucci said. "If buns were in, she had to have it. If braids were in, she had to have them. She looked so beautiful. She had so much going for her. To hear about what happened ... it's such a tragedy."
Investigators believe the couple killed and burned Sage Tyler Morgan-Abrahams between March 31 and the end of April.; police estimate the baby was between 6 months and a year old.
Authorities have not been able to positively identify the charred remains they found in the house as those of Sage, but they hope DNA tests will be able to do that.
The couple agreed to return to New Jersey to stand trial.
When
Jessica Morgan, 20, appeared by closed-circuit TV
from the Prison for Women in Pemberton Township,
she was described by prosecutors as a willing
accomplice in the beating death and incineration
of her own 8-month-old son, Sage Tyler Morgan.
