Grieving grandmother speaks out after hammer attack kills her grandson, injures her daughter and granddaughter

SOUTH SACRAMENTO -- (KTXL) -- "That was my Dante. Just starting the third grade," said Monique Brown, Dante's grandmother.

On his second day of third grade at Oakridge Elementary in South Sacramento, 8-year-old Dante Daniels didn't make it to school. He would never make it there again.

"This guy beat my grandson with a hammer. Down to his spine. They couldn't save his brain," Brown said.

Early in the morning on Sept. 1, investigators say his mother's ex-boyfriend, 23-year-old Deandre Chaney Jr., attacked Dante with a hammer. A criminal complaint alleged he also used lighter fluid. Six days later, Dante died.

Remembering him brings a smile to his grandma's face.

"Haha. He was a little," she said. "He was a lot sensitive. He didn't play with kids who were rough. He played baseball."

And in his final moments awake, Brown says the 8-year-old was a hero -- showing incredible courage in the face of his accused killer.

"Trying to save his sister from this child molester and that's why he was beat the worst," Brown said.

The criminal complaint states that Chaney murdered Dante while he was engaged in the crime of committing a lewd act on his sister.