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A 2-year-old Jersey City girl is in critical condition with third-degree burns and an in-home nurse has been charged with aggravated assault on the toddler.

(Photo provided by family)

A Hillside nurse has been charged with scalding a 2-year-old Jersey City girl on Friday, leaving her in critical condition with third degree burns to her "lower extremities," officials said today.

The nurse, Ellen Ejimkonye, 30, made her first court appearance today on the charges of aggravated assault on Destiny Malak, endangering the welfare of the child and child abuse, the criminal complaint says.

The girl’s mother, Marium Khella, said she was on her way home Friday when she received a call from Ejimkonye saying the baby had a rash on her right leg. The mother told Ejimkonye to put cream on the rash but when she arrived home she was horrified by the extent of the burns on her baby.

Khella found Destiny sitting in her high chair, soaking wet in her clothes, with red, puffy eyes from crying. She immediately began screaming for scissors so she could cut her child out of the clothes, Khella said.

"I saw no skin," Khella said. "The baby's skin came off in my hand."

Destiny’s uncle, Rob Gurgis, said the family believes the girl was in scalding hot water in the bathtub "at least 15 minutes for this to happen…There is absolutely permanent scarring -- emotionally, not just physically."

Gurgis said the girl is being treated at the Burn Center at St. Barnabas Medical Center in Livingston. A St. Barnabas spokeswoman declined to comment on the girl's condition because of her age.

Ejimkonye was arrested Saturday, Gurgis added, although a police report on the incident was not immediately available.

Destiny, who was born prematurely and requires the care of in-home nurses, is on a feeding tube and will need extreme grafting in order to minimize scarring from the burns that cover over 18 percent of her body, Gurgis said.

Gurgis added that Ejimkonye should have called 911, but instead put the girl's clothes back on.

The uncle noted that one of Destiny’s legs was less burned than the other, leading the family to believe she was trying to get out of the tub.

The girl's family had some issues with Ejimkonye, Gurgis said, and had requested that the agency not send her anymore.

Journal staff writer Julie Kayzerman contributed to this report.