OH - Annabelle Richardson, newborn, found in shallow grave, Carlisle, 7 May 2017 #1

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  • #361
I was wondering if anyone was going to live stream this trial. Thanks SeesSeas for keeping us informed!
Court tv is live streaming.
 
  • #362
Court tv is live streaming.

I believe Law and Crime website are also live-streaming the trial without so many of the breaks and discussion that CourtTV has.

Also WCPO in Cincinnati is supposed to be live-streaming, however their app was not functioning properly today.
 
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  • #363
  • #364
  • #365
When I think about it it doesn't even make any sense that she would burn the baby. I mean she is burying the baby in the yard. She's hiding the evidence. WHERE would she have even started a fire?! You don't start a fire in the yard when you are hiding the fact that you are even in the yard and burying something in it. And you can't just burn stuff in your house with any sort of ease let alone an infant. You sure as hell can't do it as a teenager with all your family members around. Was there the slightest evidence of a bonfire in the yard anywhere?

Reportedly, there was a fire pit in the backyard of the family home. The defendant reportedly removed spent pink sweetheart roses and ash from this fire pit and placed them on top of the infant in the ground before covering with soil. This was reported by defendants family in 2017 and/or earlier in the thread, shortly after charges filed.

As for the anthropologist recanting - she previously stated the infants bones were charred but on second examination corrected her statement that the bones were not charred. To my knowledge, that was the extent of her correction, and has not withdrawn that there was evidence of burning.

ETA: add link from earlier post
Why Is This 19-Year-Old on Trial for Murder?
 
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  • #366
24,000 women get pregnant every year in the US, and give birth to still born babies. That is not an insignificant number.

It may also be possible that baby died shortly after birth due to complications, perhaps she was born not breathing.

Vasa Previa is an extremely rare placental condition which carries a still birth risk of 56%. I had it in both of my pregnancies, how wild is that?! Had I had my babies at home, neither of them would have survived. My condition was not diagnosed during my 1st pregnancy and was discovered by pure chance during my 2nd. But for the Grace of God, I was very nearly one of that 1% my 9 year old is desperately lucky to be here.

The article above states that they may not ever know the cause of the baby's death. In that case, I'm interested to know how they are going to go about proving she caused the unknown cause of death??

If she was indicted by a grand jury based on evidence that has now been recanted then it is my belief that the charges should be dismissed. I'm from the UK and I'm not sure exactly how the system works in the US but if the prosecution have evidence beyond that which has been recanted, could she be indicted again? In the UK the charges would most likely be dropped but she could be arrested and charged again based on new evidence.

In the US, (and Ohio specifically) grand jury proceedings are secret. Members of grand jury deliberations are completely private, and no one outside of the 9-person grand jury may attend. It also takes 7 members of grand jury to agree to indict. It should be obvious that more evidence than the anthropologist testimony was responsible for the indictment of defendant. To my knowledge, the anthropologist initially testified that the infants bones were charred, and upon second exam corrected her statement that bones were not charred. That is not the same as saying there was no evidence of burning.

I'm really glad we will finally learn all the evidence of this tragedy. The defendant and her family have suffered over these allegations for more than two years.

https://www.acluohio.org/ohio-grand-juries-faq
 
  • #367
Everything to Know About Trial for Cheerleader Accused of Murdering Her Newborn and Burying Body

Sept 3, 2019

Jury selection began on Tuesday in the trial of an Ohio woman accused of killing and burying her newborn daughter.

Brooke Skylar Richardson, now 20, is charged with aggravated murder, involuntary manslaughter, gross abuse of a corpse, tampering with evidence and child endangerment. She has pleaded not guilty.

[...]

Prosecutors allege that Richardson did not want to be an 18-year-old single mom with college only a few months away. In the months after learning of her pregnancy, Richardson didn’t return for an ultrasound, bloodwork or any other treatment, while ignoring calls from the doctor and assistants, prosecutors have said.

But Richardson’s defense attorneys argued that the baby was stillborn and didn’t meet the legal criteria to be considered a child.

[...]

“This case was about a massive rush to judgment,” Rittgers told the jury pool, according to Cincinnati.com. “They disregard all truth that does not fit into their story.”

One of the biggest points of contention was whether Richardson burned the body of her newborn before burying her. While the police initially believed she had done so, they have now backed off from that claim.

In an email exchange with a forensic pathologist, Dr. Elizabeth Murray wrote that “whether the bones were burned or not, that baby was still dead, had unexplained skull fractures, and was buried the backyard. I don’t understand why the burning takes it up such a notch.”
 
  • #368
Skylar Richardson trial: Opening statements begin in case of ex-cheerleader charged in newborn's death

Sept 3, 2019

LEBANON, Ohio - Opening statements in the Brooke "Skylar" Richardson trial are expected to begin Wednesday morning.

Richardson is accused of killing her newborn daughter in 2017 and burying the girl in her backyard – only a few days after prom. The 20-year-old is charged with aggravated murder and involuntary manslaughter.

Her family says the child was stillborn and Richardson, then 18, didn’t know what else to do but bury her. If convicted, she could spend the rest of her life in prison.

792778c4-2872-4660-8c4d-0ececb797afb-Skylar1.JPG


After opening statements on Wednesday, prosecutors will begin calling witnesses. The trial is scheduled to last two weeks.
 
  • #369
Wednesday, Sept. 4th:
*Trial continues (Day 2) (@ 8:45am ET) - OH - A few hours old baby girl Annabelle “Baby Jane Doe” (May 7, 2017, Carlisle, baby found buried on July 14, 2017) - *Brooke 'Skylar' Richardson (18/now 20) arrested (8/4/17), charged & indicted (8/4/17) & arraigned (8/7/17) on multiple felony charges including aggravated murder (special felony,) involuntary manslaughter (1st degree felony), endangerment of child (3rd degree felony), tampering with evidence (3rd degree felony), & gross abuse of corpse (5th degree felony); allegedly killing, burning & burying her newborn baby in backyard of her Carlisle home. Free on $50K bond. House arrest & is placed on a curfew from 9pm to 7am, GPS monitoring, random drug tests & unannounced home visits will continue & surrendered passport.
Trial started on Sept. 3, 2019 (to 9/13/19 on court site). Jury selection began on 9/3/19 with an initial jury pool of 70 people. Jury: 7 women, 5 men. Alternates: 2 women, 1 man.
9/3/19 Day 1 Jury Selection. The jury and three alternates have been selected. 5 men, 7 women, 3 alternates (1 man, 2 women). Judge Oda addressing the jury about rules and staying away from any media coverage or social media coverage. He also told them not to drive by the Richardson residence during the course of the trial. Day 2 of trial will begin tomorrow, 9/4 at 8:45 with opening statements.
 
  • #370
ETA: Lengthy article at link that author attributes to BSR, her aunt and mother. A week before prom, BSR goes to gynecologist for the first time and obtains bc pill Rx at her mom's direction. A missed opportunity to tell mom the pill too late as she was already pregnant. Mom Kim also acknowledges how "ash" was found/ tested with remains.

Why Is This 19-Year-Old on Trial for Murder?

March 23, 2018 -- Good Housekeeping

.....The police were at their house saying Skylar (whose first name is Brooke, but she goes by her middle name) needed to come down to the station for questioning because she “may have witnessed something.”

“Get over here, now,” Skylar’s dad, Scott, told her over the phone, and together they drove the half-mile to the Carlisle, Ohio police station for the interview. No need for a lawyer, the police said, according to Skylar’s aunt Vanessa. The questions would be routine.

Skylar knew why she was there. In a private room, away from her parents, Vanessa says the officers asked about a tip they’d received from the county coroner. Skylar, then 18, told them everything: that she’d unexpectedly given birth to a stillborn baby in the middle of the night two months earlier. That she hadn’t known what to do, so she did what she thought you do with dead bodies: She buried it.

[...]

Night fell, and when Scott, Skylar, and her mother Kim got home, it was clear to Jay they had been crying. Exhausted, they pushed through the crowd still gathered outside their house, grabbed some clothes and toiletries, and left again to find a hotel room. Vanessa says the Richardsons watched on TV, shocked, as authorities took soil samples from their yard and bagged burned scraps from their fire pit. They were inside the house, too, ripping out the carpets and confiscating computer hard drives, phones, iPads, Kindles. Why did they need the bathroom rugs?

[...]

Because of a gag order issued by the judge, Skylar, her parents, and both sides' lawyers have been barred from speaking about the case for most of its duration, and Skylar maintains that she won't speak publicly until her trial. But through interviews with her close family members and friends - and with those who accuse her of murder - I've pieced together what she says really happened.

[...]

A lot of this, from my perspective in viewing this evidence, came down to a situation where if members of the community were to find out that the Richardson girl was pregnant and perhaps gave birth, and even if after giving birth gave that child up for adoption, that was something that simply was not going to be accepted in that household, at least by Skylar and her mother."

[...]

When senior year rolled around, Skylar was excited about her future for the first time in a while. She was on student council and the honor roll, volunteered at a soup kitchen, and taught cheerleading to kids with disabilities. She'd been accepted to the University of Cincinnati, and planned to move onto campus as a freshman the next fall to study psychology.

After years of severely disordered eating, Skylar's family was relieved when she started putting on weight. She was more confident, and briefly dated a student from another school in the fall of 2016, then found Brandon, a guy who was a year younger at her school. They started dating in January 2017.

Brandon and Skylar's families say they don't believe Brandon was the father of the baby, and he says he never suspected she was pregnant. "She looked beautiful, we were hanging out every day," Brandon says. "I didn't notice anything."

[...]

On April 26, the week before her prom, Kim confirms that Skylar went to her first-ever gynecologist appointment with Dr. William Andrew at Hilltop OB-GYN. Her body had always menstruated erratically because of her eating, and she was concerned about the abnormally heavy periods with sporadic spotting she'd been experiencing over the past few months. Vanessa says that Kim had also noticed Skylar had been spending a lot of time with Brandon, and the two had discussed Skylar getting a prescription for birth control pills.

But at her appointment, after an examination, Dr. Andrew told Skylar that he could not prescribe her birth control because she was already approximately 32 weeks pregnant. According to Vanessa, who says she heard the story from Skylar after her arrest, Skylar left that appointment with a warning from her doctor: he would give her the birth control prescription so her mom wouldn't ask questions, but she should tell her parents about the pregnancy as soon as possible.

After the appointment, according to Vanessa, Skylar seemed upset, but Kim didn't question her daughter. A young woman's first trip to the gynecologist can be stressful, she figured. They filled the birth control prescription and didn't discuss the appointment any further.

Only Skylar knows for sure what happened about 36 hours later, when she says she gave birth to a lifeless baby in the middle of the night. Her mother, Kim, tells me that Skylar had woken up with some stomach pains and needed to go to the bathroom. When she went, the baby came out quickly. Shocked, Skylar looked for a pulse in its limp body, but couldn't find one. She wrapped the baby in a towel and cradled it for hours, crying. According to court documents filed by Rittgers and confirmed by Kim, sometime in the night, Skylar decided to name her baby Annabelle. "When she saw her, she thought of how pure and beautiful she was," Kim tells me. "I'd never heard the name before." Eventually, Skylar took the baby outside through the back door, found a shovel in the garage, and dug a small grave.

When I ask if the prosecutor's accusation that Skylar burned the body is accurate, Kim unequivocally says no. She does offer an explanation that might explain any ash in the tested remains: The family often burns boxes and other biodegradable trash in their backyard fire pit, Kim says, and, after prom, Skylar had dropped the then-wilting flowers Brandon had given her - a bunch of small sweetheart roses - into the pile of ash for the next burn. But as she dug Annabelle's grave, Skylar remembered the flowers, and retrieved them. Kim says Skylar recalled placing a pink rose on her grandmother's casket the year prior, and decided to do the same for the baby.
 
  • #371
Cheerleader Accused of Murdering, Burying Newborn Goes on Trial

Sept 3, 2019

Richardson’s trial was delayed for years in part because the defense moved several times to omit evidence, and twice to have the charges dismissed. Her attorneys say she has been unable to find a job in that time period, and is working part-time for their law firm while attending community college.

Advocacy groups say the prosecution sets a dangerous precedent for criminalizing pregnant people, and could lead to more erroneous charges against those who have stillbirths. Others took issue with the court’s decision to let Richardson’s doctors testify, in what they say is a breach of doctor-patient confidentiality.
 
  • #372
I'm sure this will come out at trial but when Skylar went to the ob/gyn to get birth control and was told she was 32 weeks pregnant did the Dr. do a sonogram to check gestational age for sure or was the just a guess based off of what Skylar said and her fundus size? I will be interested to hear if the baby was believed to be full term or was really only 32 weeks. When I worked labor and delivery and we had a patient come in who "didn't know she was pregnant" or who knew but had not sought prenatal care we immediately did a sono for dating to try and determine if baby was full term or not. I would imagine that a teenager coming into an appt that far along they would have done a sono that day in the office to get a size and date on the baby, check for any issues with the baby like heart or kidney issues, spina bifida, cleft palate ect and check for complications like placenta previa, amniotic fluid level ect. That would need addressed quickly at that late in a pregnancy.

Also while a true stillbirth is not terribly uncommon Skylar didn't have any risk factors for a stillbirth which are obesity, maternal age over 40, diabetes, hypertension, maternal smoking or drug use, ethnicity black or Hispanic.
 
  • #373
Also from other cases I've followed here like Erika Murray, as well as a college classmate of mine who hid her pregnancy and then smothered her baby and threw it away in a duffle bag, I feel like she'll get off or get a slap on the wrist. It seems to me like there is an immense amount of leniency for women who hide pregnancies and neglect or kill their newborns. Melissa Drexler who delivered her baby in the bathroom stall at her prom, threw the baby in the trash and went back to the dance only served 3 years of a 15 year sentence so I doubt Skylar will see any time no matter if she is convicted or not.
 
  • #374
I'm sure this will come out at trial but when Skylar went to the ob/gyn to get birth control and was told she was 32 weeks pregnant did the Dr. do a sonogram to check gestational age for sure or was the just a guess based off of what Skylar said and her fundus size? I will be interested to hear if the baby was believed to be full term or was really only 32 weeks. When I worked labor and delivery and we had a patient come in who "didn't know she was pregnant" or who knew but had not sought prenatal care we immediately did a sono for dating to try and determine if baby was full term or not. I would imagine that a teenager coming into an appt that far along they would have done a sono that day in the office to get a size and date on the baby, check for any issues with the baby like heart or kidney issues, spina bifida, cleft palate ect and check for complications like placenta previa, amniotic fluid level ect. That would need addressed quickly at that late in a pregnancy.

Also while a true stillbirth is not terribly uncommon Skylar didn't have any risk factors for a stillbirth which are obesity, maternal age over 40, diabetes, hypertension, maternal smoking or drug use, ethnicity black or Hispanic.

Commentary during juror selection today reported doctor was in error when he measured Skylar at 32 weeks (more likely 38). I don't believe she had sonogram during appointment for birth control, and was suppose to return to clinic for complete pre- natal exam but never did.

Prosecutors allege that Richardson did not want to be an 18-year-old single mom with college only a few months away. In the months after learning of her pregnancy, Richardson didn’t return for an ultrasound, bloodwork or any other treatment, while ignoring calls from the doctor and assistants, prosecutors have said.
 
  • #375
Commentary during juror selection today reported doctor was in error when he measured Skylar at 32 weeks (more likely 38). I don't believe she had sonogram during appointment for birth control, and was suppose to return to clinic for complete pre- natal exam but never did.

Thanks for that, exactly what I had missed but wanted to know.
 
  • #376
Also from other cases I've followed here like Erika Murray, as well as a college classmate of mine who hid her pregnancy and then smothered her baby and threw it away in a duffle bag, I feel like she'll get off or get a slap on the wrist. It seems to me like there is an immense amount of leniency for women who hide pregnancies and neglect or kill their newborns. Melissa Drexler who delivered her baby in the bathroom stall at her prom, threw the baby in the trash and went back to the dance only served 3 years of a 15 year sentence so I doubt Skylar will see any time no matter if she is convicted or not.

I also don't believe Skylar will serve a lengthy sentence. I think her defense is confident she will only be found guilty of gross abuse of a corpse, and tampering with evidence -- and why they refused plea deal by prosecutor.

As Skylar had no prenatal care and delivered infant alone, I think it's plausible the baby was stillborn. If so, aggravated murder would be overcharge.

I'm very interested in the interrogation "confessions" that jury will hear. If the investigators can be shown coercing the defendant, it's all over for the prosecution.

MOO
 
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  • #377
In the US, (and Ohio specifically) grand jury proceedings are secret. Members of grand jury deliberations are completely private, and no one outside of the 9-person grand jury may attend. It also takes 7 members of grand jury to agree to indict. It should be obvious that more evidence than the anthropologist testimony was responsible for the indictment of defendant. To my knowledge, the anthropologist initially testified that the infants bones were charred, and upon second exam corrected her statement that bones were not charred. That is not the same as saying there was no evidence of burning.

I'm really glad we will finally learn all the evidence of this tragedy. The defendant and her family have suffered over these allegations for more than two years.

https://www.acluohio.org/ohio-grand-juries-faq

Thank you for the information. This is quite a different system to that on which we operate in the UK. I also believe there are some quite significant cultural differences which could affect how this case has been received and reported (n.b. I am strongly pro-life which I personally believe to be quite unusual in the UK, at least where I am.)

Of course I agree that there must be further evidence to have secured an indictment and I have expressed this previously, what remains to be seen is whether that evidence is strong enough to secure a conviction beyond all reasonable doubt. However, as Judge Oda said himself, Skylar has the presumption of innocence. It is impossible to come to any conclusion before any evidence has been heard. I am particularly interested in the medical evidence as pregnancy complication and still-birth is very personal to me.

I wholeheartedly agree with your final paragraph. There are only two possible scenarios here, both of them are unspeakably tragic.
 
  • #378
  • #379
I also don't believe Skylar will serve a lengthy sentence. I think her defense is confident she will only be found guilty of gross abuse of a corpse, and tampering with evidence -- and why they refused plea deal by prosecutor.

As Skylar had no prenatal care and delivered infant alone, I think it's plausible the baby was stillborn. If so, aggravated murder would be overcharge.

I'm interested in the "confessions" that jury will hear. If the investigators can be shown coercing the defendant, it's all over for the prosecution.

MOO

I heard the defence say yesterday that "the prosecution believe they have a confession" which leads me to think (although I may be wrong) that this is what they are focussing their case on rather than any medical evidence. Particularly as they have readily admitted that they do not know the cause of death, or so I have read. Please correct me if I am wrong.

I also think it is possible that Skylar may have said something during interrogation that could be construed as a confession. I feel guilt for how my eldest son came into the world, he's 9 years old and is now completely healthy.
 
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  • #380
Reportedly, there was a fire pit in the backyard of the family home. The defendant reportedly removed spent pink sweetheart roses and ash from this fire pit and placed them on top of the infant in the ground before covering with soil. This was reported by defendants family in 2017 and/or earlier in the thread, shortly after charges filed.

As for the anthropologist recanting - she previously stated the infants bones were charred but on second examination corrected her statement that the bones were not charred. To my knowledge, that was the extent of her correction, and has not withdrawn that there was evidence of burning.

ETA: add link from earlier post
Why Is This 19-Year-Old on Trial for Murder?
why wouldn't she save her flowers. it was prom night. she just throws them away in a fire pit? i don't buy it
 
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