"He would not touch a child ... He’s got daughters and granddaughters he’s watched when he’s come to visit me," his daughter Carolyn Whetston told the New York Daily News. She added that he was disabled and "didn’t have the physical ability to do that."
The daughter of 80-year-old Robert Raynor, whose body was found with the words “I touch little girls” scrawled in marker across his chest, is insisting he wasn’t that kind of person.
“That’s not my father,” said daughter Carolyn Whetstone, according to New York Daily News. “He would not touch a child. He would never violate anyone. He’s got daughters and granddaughters he’s watched when he’s come to visit me. That’s not him. That’s not true.”
Raynor’s son, 53-year-old Thayer Raynor, was equally as shocked by his father’s death, which the New York City Medical Examiner has ruled a homicide.
“It’s difficult to hear that somebody was brutally killed, regardless of what the situation is,” he said, according to SILive.com.
The elder Raynor had cancer, and suffered from arthritis in the knees, his loved ones said. “He didn’t have the physical ability to do that,” Whetstone, who lies in North Carolina, told the Daily News.
Raynor was discovered dead Monday morning. His body was found lying outside his home, in the hallway of his Tompkinsville, Staten Island apartment and first responders pronounced him dead at the scene, the NYPD told Inside Edition Digital.
In addition to the words “I touch little girls” scrawled across his chest in marker, the body also bore the message “I take dolls in my room for girls 1-5” on his stomach,” a witness told the Daily News.
“What was written on his chest was just disrespectful,” neighbor Isaac Williams, who found his body, told the Daily News.
Raynor was also found with a broken nose, injuries on the arms and swelling to his eyes and cheeks, according to the Daily News.
Thayer Raynor said he and his father did not have a relationship, and said they have only spoken twice in the last 35 years, according to the New York Post. Neither of Raynor’s kids say they have spoken to him in the last year or more, since the pandemic, the Post reported.
Whetstone said she has had trouble reaching him by phone.
“When I finally did talk to him last month he told me he was barely able to move,” Whetstone told the Daily News. “It was that bad.”
Neighbors also said Raynor was disabled and struggled with his arthritis, and it is believed that he was dragged into the hallway, the Daily News reported.
“The man hardly ever came outside,” Williams said, according to the Post. “He could barely walk. He could barely lift his arms up. When he’d go to the store to buy beer, he had to put a backpack on for two little cans because he couldn’t carry them. That’s how pitiful his state was. The man looked like he was 110.”
Williams added that when he found his body, he first assumed he was drunk and had fallen, “even though I’d never seen him drunk,” the Post reported.
Raynor had been living with a paid in-home aide, 28-year-old Renee Ayarde, and her young daughter, the Daily News reported.
Just six hours after Raynor’s body was discovered, Ayarde was charged with the assault of her 3-year-old daughter, according to the Daily News.
Ayarde had allegedly dropped her child onto the concrete and dragged her along the Lower East Side, Manhattan street before throwing a water bottle at her face, authorities told the Daily News.
When a witness attempted to call 911, Ayarde allegedly grabbed the phone from her hands and knocked her to the ground, according to prosecutors. The witness was reportedly left with minor injuries.
Ayarde’s 3-year-old daughter was later taken to the hospital with bruising on her neck, and healthcare workers noted other old injuries around the body, a criminal complaint said, the Daily News reported.
“I was outside and mommy threw me on the floor,” the girl said, according to court papers cited by the Daily News.
Ayarde was arraigned Wednesday morning and was ordered held on $5,000 bail on charges of assaulting a child, the Daily News reported.
Robert Raynor also has a lengthy rap sheet, including 24 arrests, according to the New York Post. Only four of the charges were unsealed, including two assaults against a girlfriend in 1987, an assault in 1992 and a drug possession charge in 1996, the Post reported, citing a source.
Robert Raynor's name does not appear in the state’s online registry of known sex offenders, the Post reported.
Ayarde has not been named a suspect in Raynor’s homicide.
