US3 min(s) read
Major update on Kentucky cheerleader arrested after newborn was found dead dumped in trash bag
A new update has been shared in the case of former University of Kentucky cheerleader Laken Snelling, after her newborn son was found dead inside her closet in August last year.
The 21-year-old was accused of hiding the body of her baby, wrapped in a towel inside a trash bag, inside her closet.
The former cheerleader was arrested by authorities in Lexington, Kentucky, after the grim discovery was made, and faced charges of abuse of a corpse, tampering with physical evidence, and concealing the birth of an infant.
According to reports from the New York Post, Snelling has been indicted on first-degree manslaughter by a Fayette County grand jury on Tuesday, after the Kentucky Medical Examiner’s Office determined the baby was born alive.
It found that the baby boy’s cause of death was asphyxia by undetermined means, WKYT reports.
Fayette Commonwealth’s Attorney Kimberly Baird told the outlet: “They were given the information about homicide, the four levels of homicide and then deliberated and decided that manslaughter first degree was the charge that should come out of the grand jury.”
Snelling had pleaded guilty to charges of abuse of a corpse, tampering with physical evidence, and concealing the birth of an infant, and had been on house arrest at her family home in Tennessee.
After her arrest, Snelling withdrew from the University of Kentucky and is no longer a member of the STUNT cheerleading team.
She now faces up to 20 years in prison for first-degree manslaughter, and a further 11 years for the remaining charges if found guilty.
According to reports, the 21-year-old gave birth to the baby boy at around 4AM on August 27 in her off-campus house in Lexington.
Her roommates, who’d suspected Snelling was hiding being pregnant, told police they’d heard loud, unusual noises coming from her room throughout the early hours of the morning.
They claimed that Snelling had cleaned up the blood after giving birth, showered, and left the house to go to McDonald’s, skipping her morning classes and a visit to the school clinic.
While she was gone, her roommates entered her bedroom and discovered a “blood-soaked towel on the floor and a plastic bag containing evidence of childbirth.”
They called 911 after they found the newborn baby inside a black plastic trash bag in a closet, telling the operator that the baby was “cold to the touch”.
Police were waiting for Snelling when she returned home, and she initially told them that the baby fell on the floor after she gave birth and didn’t think he was “breathing or alive”.
She claimed that she passed out “on top of the baby” and woke up to find “the baby turning blue and purple.”
Court documents state that Snelling said she had wrapped the baby up “like a burrito and laid next to it” because it “gave her a little comfort in the moment.”
However an investigation later revealed that she had told medical staff that the newborn had made a “whimper” after he was born and showed “a little bit of fetal movement.”
She also allegedly took several photos while in labor but had deleted them “in an attempt to hide the birth,” police said, and investigators believe other images might have been successfully destroyed before she was arrested.