Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - 'Baby Killer' Murdered Young Kids and Burned Their Bodies: Sheriff

Episode Date: October 10, 2024

A couple in Jasper County, Indiana face a number of charges including murder after deputies said the father told a friend he killed their two children and later burned their bodies in a burn pit. Text messages revealed conversations between Samantha Sebella and Steven Valle about the infants. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy looks at the allegations in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show covering the biggest stories in crime.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Get 50% off of confidential background reports at https://www.truthfinder.com/lccrimefix and access information about almost anyone!Host:Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5Guest:Philip Dubé  https://x.com/PhilipCDubeCRIME FIX PRODUCTION:Head of Social Media, YouTube - Bobby SzokeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinVideo Editing - Daniel CamachoGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this law and crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. A couple is in jail after the sheriff says bones, possibly belonging to babies, were found in a burn pit on their former property. I have the disturbing details about this case out of Indiana and the text messages detectives say this couple exchanged. Welcome to Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy. Just when I think I've heard just about everything, I find a case like this one. Samantha Sabella and Stephen Valley are in jail in Jasper

County, Indiana. They face a number of charges, including murder for the deaths of their two infant children. Now, if the allegations of murdering infants weren't bad enough, what makes this case more shocking is that no one even knew these children existed, according to the sheriff's office. Deputies searched the home where the couple used to live after receiving a tip that Stephen Valley had confessed to killing the babies. Detectives say this happened while Valley was staying with a friend after he became upset with Samantha Sabella over her use of methamphetamine. The affidavit says, Cody proceeded to say that he and Stephen had consumed some vodka

and Stephen then confided some sensitive information. Cody stated that Stephen had told him that, I killed two of my kids. I burnt them in the fire pit at my house. Cody said that he had inquired further and Stephen had told him that they had smothered their first born, but had drowned the second born and burnt their bodies in the fire pit at their house. Can you imagine? You're hanging out with some guy that you consider a friend.

You've had some drinks and he says, hey, I killed my kids. They're in the burn pit at my house. This guy probably could not believe what he was hearing. So of course, the detectives got search warrants for the house and the couple's phones. So let's start with the phones. The detective wrote, I found multiple statements on Samantha's device that indicated to me that she could very well have been pregnant on three separate occasions and that she has knowledge of two of the children being killed and burnt by Stephen Valley. On September 17th, detectives said Samantha texted Stephen, guess what, baby killer? An hour later, she texted, you killed my kids because you are a homophobic slur. You never loved me.

That same day, the affidavit says at the same time Samantha sent that message, she texted a friend of Stephen's from his phone. He burnt them in the backyard, Alex. Later that day, Stephen texted back. Yeah, I know the fire will be known for what you did. Samantha then responded, LOL, okay, fire burner. Two hours later, the detective said Samantha texted Stephen, yes, you will to baby killer. Now the detective said that these text messages continued with Samantha texting Stephen the following evening. One read in all caps, baby killer. Then make sure he doesn't kill other girls' babies. And he burnt our babies in the backyard. You killed our babies, said another text. I have

their DNA in my body forever. Now I think you can get the picture. Detectives said they found that Samantha was tracking a pregnancy using the calendar on her phone. Then they said they interviewed Stephen Valley, who claimed Samantha had had a baby boy in 2018. The affidavit says, Stephen found Samantha passed out and the child was lying between her legs. The baby was not breathing, nor were his eyes open. Stephen cleaned him up to make him look pretty and wrapped him in a blanket, face exposed, and placed him into a box. After three days, he knew the child wasn't coming back to life, so he buried him in the backyard near a shed. The detectives say that Valley then claimed that sometime after that,

Samantha Sabella became pregnant again. The affidavit continues. After that, Samantha became pregnant again, this time a premature female child was born while he was at work. She gave birth in the bathtub and wrapped the baby in a blanket. Stephen took her to the backyard and buried her with the first male child. So according to detectives, Stephen Valley is claiming that on two occasions, Samantha Sabella gave birth at home to two babies who just happened to die, so he buried them. But wait, it gets worse. The affidavit continues, quoting Valli as saying, both children were buried for three to five years before he dug them up and burned them in the fire pit. He sifted through the ashes and did

see small bone fragments. He kept some of those ashes to make a necklace as a memento. This case really got me thinking about how you might not really know what might be going on at the house right next door. So I decided to look up Samantha Sabella and Stephen Valley on truthfinder.com to see what I might find. Truthfinder.com is the largest public record search service. You can find a lot of information like past addresses, the names of relatives,

and traffic and criminal conviction records. I searched for Stephen Valley and got results for him living in Wheatfield, Indiana, and it showed a misdemeanor case from 2017 for marijuana possession. I searched for Samantha Sabella, and her name did not appear in the results, which isn't completely surprising given the fact that they're saying there weren't any social security records or birth certificates for the infants in this case. Now, what's great about truthfinder.com is it will give you the names and addresses of sex offenders who live in your neighborhood to help you keep your family safe. Right now, I have a great deal for you. You can get 50% off of

confidential background reports. Just log on to truthfinder.com slash lccrimefix and start accessing information about almost anyone. Deputies searched the property where the couple used to live, and they said a canine hit on the fire pit. Bones found in the burn pit, according to detectives, were sent to a forensic anthropologist who determined they were indeed bone fragments, but more testing will be needed to determine the exact origin of the bones. And I mentioned earlier that nobody knew these children existed. Well, that is because the detectives say these children were born at home. They had no birth certificates and no social security cards. Philip Dubé is court appointed counsel working in Los Angeles, obviously not affiliated with this case. Philip, this is a strange one, very sad,

but I think they're going to have a challenge here in that they're not going to be able to determine, it sounds like, how these infants died because all that's left is bones. Oh, yeah. And the only thing that they can really rely on are the statements of both of these defendants. Indiana, like most states in the country, has what's called the corpus delicti rule. And sometimes we affectionately refer to it as the corpus cop-out rule, meaning the prosecution has to prove every element of a crime, put on some evidence of a crime, before they can introduce the statements of a defendant. So for example, murder requires a homicide, the death of another with malice aforethought. If you cannot, independent of the

statements of both of these defendants, prove up some evidence of a murder, not a death, but an actual murder, their statements cannot come into evidence. So I don't know how they're going to proceed under Indiana law. It's going to take a gutsy judge to say, you know what, those statements are not coming in in front of the jury, unless you can somehow tie in an intent to kill. And the fact that it was death of another, you know, a human being somehow connected to these people. Otherwise, you just can't proceed, you know. So sometimes the defense can move for what we call a directed verdict if there's not enough to give to the jury that these defendants on trial actually committed the murders. It's interesting to me how this whole thing started. I mean, you have a friend who Stephen Valley is staying with and he calls

police because he says, oh my gosh, we were drinking. And he comes out and says, I killed our two babies. And this is how we did it. The one was smothered, the other was drowned. And then we burned them in the burn pit. Oh my gosh. I just can't even imagine, as I said earlier, this hearing somebody say something like this. So they call the police and then they are led to all of this evidence, which includes text messages and then these bones, which they still, the anthropologist has said they are bones, but hasn't said what origin they are. So, I mean, there is evidence here. I mean, there is evidence, but the cause of death is going to be key, as we just discussed. So talk to me about these text messages as well. That's the other big piece of evidence. We have Samantha Sabella sending these

text messages saying, baby killer, you killed my babies. You never loved me. All of this stuff. It's very, very odd. Well, if they are tried jointly as co-defendants or as co-conspirators, let's just assume that they're just co-defendants. The statements of a non-testifying co-defendant are inadmissible in evidence because they cannot be cross-examined. So let's say they want to introduce her statements against him, but they don't have her to testify. Those statements are not coming in. It violates what we call the Aranda-Bruton rule. And it's plain and simple. It would violate a fundamental right to cross-examine the declarant, if you will, the person who made that statement. So I don't see that coming in. Now, if they are going under a conspiracy theory, the high court has held that statements of co-conspirators can come in without running afoul of what we call the Aranda-Bruton rule. But I don't believe that they are being charged as co-conspirators. I think they're just being

charged independently or individually with murder and with a neglect causing death. So absent some type of conspiracy theory, they're going to have a problem introducing all these statements into evidence. What's so odd to me about this case is you have this couple and they have an older child. Okay. And obviously these are people who don't have any means. It sounds like there's drug use. Samantha allegedly is using methamphetamines, and Stephen's upset about it.

But they have this other child, apparently a four-year-old. None of these children have any documentation, no Social Security cards, no birth certificates. How common is this type of thing? I can't even imagine you're having children at home, allegedly birth certificates. How common is this type of thing? I mean, I can't even imagine you're having children at home, allegedly three children that have been born at home. Two were allegedly, according to sheriff's deputies, murdered. And you have the older one who was living, obviously, and now hopefully is in the care of state officials. But this is really odd. Well, home birth is quite common in this country, but typically you're given the aid of a midwife

or a doula. And under the midwifery regulations, they have to still fill out all the appropriate paperwork after a child is brought into the world and file it with the county clerk, file it with local hospitals, so that there is some record on file and you can generate a birth certificate. If you don't do that, it's a crime. It is actually a crime to deliver without reporting the birth of a child. Now, it's not the crime of the century. It's probably a misdemeanor. And I think in Indiana, it's like 180 day misdemeanor. I don't even believe it's a felony, but it is fairly common. First of all, there are a lot of people who don't have insurance. You get a lot of transient folks who get hypersexual while they're under the influence of drugs and alcohol. And before you know it, they're pregnant.

They don't have the presence of mind, or maybe it's unlawful, such as in the state of Indiana, to even seek an abortion or to get an abortion. And so what do they do? They deliver in the privacy of their own home. And they don't have the wherewithal, the means, or just the forethought to go down and register this infant. They just don't. But what Indiana does have, they have what's called the safe haven laws,

meaning if you give birth to a child and you just don't want that kid or you're incapable, there are 53 drop-off points in the state of Indiana, such as with fire, police, medical facilities, where they actually have what's called baby boxes. And you can deposit that baby in a box. No questions asked, no arrest, no criminal prosecution. So in a way it's inexcusable for this type of stuff to happen. Stephen Valley, in my opinion, is going to have a problem when he has to, you know, he's given a statement to law enforcement. He gave a statement to law enforcement in which he said, basically, he came home and, you know, Samantha had given birth to the one child and the child was not alive. And so he wrapped up the child to make it pretty or what have you.

And then talks about the other child, the girl being dead and that he buried these children, then dug them up later and burned their remains and then kept the ashes or whatever to make a necklace. I mean, that's going to be a problem even if they can't prove the cause of death. Is a jury going to believe that you just happen to have two stillborn children and that, oh, I went and buried them in the backyard and then dug them up and burned their remains to make a necklace? Well, first of all, remember, it's the prosecution's burden to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it's a homicide. In other words, death at the hands of another, as opposed to just a death. If all you have is just a death, those statements are not even coming in. A really thoughtful, brave judge will say, prosecutor, if that's all you have, those statements are not coming in. The fact of a death

is not enough to prove malice of forethought, meaning an intent to kill. And I mean even an express or an implied intent. You just can't get it in, any of those statements. So the prosecution, I think, has got an uphill battle here, you know? But let's assume you do get a brave enough judge who just ignores the corpus delicti rule and allows it all in. The jury is not going to have any sympathy. The burden is now going to shift to them to show that they didn't have the culpable mens rea at the time, or that he was so heavily intoxicated, either from the effects of drugs, alcohol, or both, that he didn't know what he was saying. Because you say to yourself, who in their right mind would or could ever do this? Well, they both were not in their right

mind. They were non-composementous, in my opinion. They should not have been having children. The problem also is, though, that even if a judge allows it in and they do introduce evidence of intoxication, it is not a defense under Indiana law. Voluntary intoxication does not provide a basis to negate the mens rea, to kill, either under an insanity theory or under a straight up elements to murder type theory. So they'll be sunk if those statements come in. And my advice to any defense counsel who has to defend these two, or if they each have their own counsel, is to settle.

Interesting. Philip Dubé, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Ann Jeanette Levy. Thanks so much for being with me. I'll see you back here next time.