An 18-year-old in Dothan, Alabama, is facing a capital murder charge after police found the remains of her newborn baby in a dumpster last week.
The Dothan Police Department announced on Thursday, Aug. 24, that 18-year-old Jakayla Ashanti Williams was arrested after confessing she placed her newborn baby in a dumpster to die.
Dothan police say they were alerted on Thursday, Aug. 24, by Southeast Health Medical Center staff, who reported the Williams family contacted them to recover a child Williams claimed to have left the week prior.
Police say Williams’ parents were unaware of their daughter’s pregnancy or that she had given birth in her room at home in the early morning hours of Aug. 13. When the parents learned of these events on Aug. 23, they reached out to the hospital to ensure the baby’s safety.
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That led to police confronting Williams directly in an interview, the teen admitted to leaving the child wrapped in a cloth inside an apartment complex dumpster. According to Williams, the child was alive when she left it there. Police said she told them she did not want the child., Al.com reports.
The officers would rush to the apartment complex dumpster and discover it was connected to a trash compactor. They found the remains of the newborn child wrapped in a mattress protector zipped inside a duffel bag.
“I’ve never even heard of something so horrific as this. It shocks the mind. It shocks the soul,” Dothan Police Chief Will Benny said at the news conference Thursday.
The Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences in Montgomery confirmed that the remains discovered at the crime scene belonged to Williams’ newborn baby.
Williams has a court-appointed attorney. If found guilty of the charges against her, she could be sentenced to a life sentence without parole or even the death penalty.
