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Father of Laken Snelling's baby breaks silence after she is sentenced to 10 years for manslaughter
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The father of Laken Snelling's baby boy has spoken publicly for the first time, telling a courtroom that the loss of his son hurts in a way that is 'unexplainable' as the former University of Kentucky cheerleader was sentenced to 10 years in prison for killing the newborn.
Izaiah Hall addressed the court during Friday's hearing in Fayette Circuit Court. His family stood beside him. They referred to the baby as Cade, a name nobody had heard publicly until today because Snelling never told anyone about the pregnancy or the birth.
"I don't wish the worst on Laken," Hall said.
A member of his family was more direct. "He was not garbage."
What happened in court
Judge Diane Minnifield accepted the prosecution's recommendation and sentenced Snelling, 22, to 10 years on the first-degree manslaughter charge. She received concurrent one-year sentences on each of the three additional charges: abuse of a corpse, concealing the birth of an infant, and tampering with physical evidence.
The judge told Snelling she would not be eligible for probation because the manslaughter conviction is classified as a 'crime of violence'. She may be eligible for parole after serving 85% of her sentence, which works out to roughly eight and a half years.
Before handing down the sentence, Minnifield addressed Snelling directly.
"You're going to have a lot of time. You're young, you're 22 years old. You're going to have a lot of life. This family of Cade is going to have a lot of life ahead of them, but this hole will never go away."
Snelling was led out of the courtroom by deputies immediately afterwards.
What Snelling admitted to
Snelling pleaded guilty on August 21 to all four charges. During that hearing, she admitted through tears to killing her son.
"I was under a lot of emotional stress and my baby came unexpectedly," she said. "And instead of helping him I ended his life."
She specifically admitted to having 'deprived him of oxygen'. She then wrapped the body in a towel and a trash bag and placed it inside her closet in her off-campus home in Lexington, Kentucky.
Her roommates found the baby the following day after hearing strange noises during the night. Snelling initially told police the baby fell on the floor during the birth and that she had passed out on top of him. She changed her story multiple times before the guilty plea put an end to the contradictions.
What happened before her arrest
After the baby was found in August 2025, Snelling was initially charged with abuse of a corpse, concealing a birth, and tampering with evidence. A manslaughter charge was not added until March 2026, after a medical examiner determined the baby had been born alive and that the cause of death was asphyxia.
She was arrested on March 12 and released on a $10,000 bond posted by her father. She withdrew from the university and was placed on house arrest at her family's home in Tennessee, splitting her days between her mother's house in Morristown and her father's in Jefferson City.
She initially pleaded not guilty to all charges. She changed her plea to guilty five months later, eliminating the need for a trial.
What the baby's father said
Hall did not speak at length. He did not need to. His presence in the courtroom, after months of silence, said most of what needed saying.
He told the court the loss was 'unexplainable'. His family named the baby Cade, something they had never been given the opportunity to do while he was alive because they did not know he existed until after he was dead.
The comment from Hall's family member, 'he was not garbage', was a direct reference to how the baby's body was found. Wrapped in a towel. Inside a trash bag. In a closet. Discovered by roommates who had no idea their housemate had been pregnant.
Hall said he did not wish the worst on Snelling. He did not say he forgave her either.
Snelling began serving her sentence on Friday. She is 22 years old. She will be eligible for parole consideration in approximately 2034. Cade's family will be living with the hole the judge described for considerably longer than that.
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