Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Sorority girl’s baby found dead in trash bag with mac-n-cheese box beside sorority house

Episode Date: January 31, 2020

Emile Weaver, a former Muskingum University student, gives birth to a baby girl inside the Delta Gamma Theta sorority house bathroom. Weaver then stuffs the newborn inside a black trash bag and leaves her to die.She's now in prison for life, but Emile thinks the punishment is too excessive for the crime.Joining Nancy to discuss: Kathleen Murphy: Family Attorney Bruce Johnson: Owner of ISP Investigations, Master Sgt. Region One Crime Scene Commander, Chicago Metro Area (Ret)  Dr. Michelle Dupre: South Carolina Medical Examiner & Author of “Homicide Investigation Field Guide”  Caryn Stark: NYC Psychologist Levi Page - Investigative reporter, CrimeOnline.com Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. A sorority at Muskingham University, the Delta Gamma Theta Sorority House there in New Concord. Sorority sisters find a very bloody bathroom. There is a sorority sister that they think has been pregnant. They can't figure out what happened, and obviously she's not saying anything. So they dare each other to go look in the trash can. Okay, and then one of them finds a trash bag, and in that plastic trash bag on the side of the Delta Gamma Theta house at Muskingum University in New Concord, Ohio, is a box of mac and cheese, an empty bag of Doritos, and a dead baby girl. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories.

Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Sheriff's investigators say they got a call from University Police just after 9 Wednesday night, reporting the discovery of the body of a newborn outside this sorority house on Lakeside Drive. The sheriff's office says it's a difficult case to investigate. You always have a soft spot in your heart for babies and children, and you never want to see anybody go through this. Investigators say if the autopsy shows the baby found here was stillborn, the mother could still face criminal charges for discarding the body.

Ohio's Safe Haven law allows either birth parent to surrender a baby within 30 days of birth to any emergency room, law enforcement officer or firefighter no questions asked those are our friends wbns cbs 10 tv that was marine cocotte speaking a baby found in the trash outside a sorority house joining me an all-star panel k Kathleen Murphy, Dr. Michelle Dupree, Karen Stark, and Levi Page. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. But what do we know? What do we know about the baby? What do we know about the evidence there at the crime scene? Straight out to Levi Page, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. What can you tell me about the initial evidence in the case? So Nancy, it's April 22nd, 2015, and we're

talking about the sorority house, the Delta Gamma Theta sorority in Muskingum, Ohio at the university there in New Concord. They found a trash bag, Nancy. They cut open the trash bag and they found a box of mac and cheese Doritos. And then they found a foot, a human foot, and they called 911. Wait a minute. Why were people digging through the trash anyway, Levi? Because the home, the bathroom there in the sorority home was covered in blood, and there was a sorority sister there that they suspected was pregnant, and they were talking

to each other, the sorority sisters. They were saying, do you think that she gave birth? What's going on with her? She's acting strange. There's blood all over the bathroom. Wait a minute. So the initial investigators were a bunch of sorority girls from Delta, Gamma, Theta, sorority. So they see blood in the bathroom. They suspect that one of their sorority sisters has

been pregnant so they go search a trash can am i understanding this and they're daring each other nancy they're saying no you go look no you go look and finally one of them did and they went through this trash can out in the backyard and they discovered a foot, a little tiny foot. They freaked out and called 911. Wait, so there was just a foot or they saw the foot attached to the baby's body? Attached to the baby's body. Oh my stars. That was the first thing that this 20-something-year-old girl saw when she was going through trash. Can't imagine putting yourself in that situation and seeing a little small foot attached to a little body in a bloody trash bag. So let me understand this scenario to Dr.

Karen Stark, a renowned psychologist joining us from New York. You can find her at Karen Stark.com. Just those three items, those three things, not really items, speaks to me. Empty mac and cheese, empty bag of Doritos, and a baby's dead body. That is very disturbing. Yeah, because what it tells you, Nancy, is that the baby was not more significant than the empty bag of Doritos or mac and cheese, that the baby was just tossed as though the baby could have been food or an item of clothing. And that fits with the idea that somebody would take a newborn and put them in a plastic bag with

these items and disregard the fact that this was a baby, a brand-new baby. You know, Karen Stark, I am in no way minimizing what the killer did. I've got to first find out if the baby was stillborn or alive. But if the baby belongs to a, let's a freshman in college i mean for all i know she just turned 18 what does that go to the mindset of the mother well it says that the person that carried this baby was somebody who had not attached to the baby, didn't want the baby, and was in extreme denial, not able to really consciously say to themselves, I am pregnant and having this baby, maybe occasionally aware of it, and then suppressing it again, because they can't deal with the impact of

the fact that they're pregnant and it's not uncommon. Take a listen to our friends at WBNS-CBS 10 TV reporter Brian Somerville. 20-year-old mother Emily Weaver charged with the murder of her baby, not even one day old. born less than a day, just hours after the body was found. Muskingum County Prosecutor Michael Haddix says the baby was born alive before being placed in a trash bag where the child died of asphyxiation. Now Weaver charged with aggravated murder, abuse of a corpse, and two counts of tampering with evidence. She concealed or removed blood and or placenta. She removed or concealed the body of the baby. Haddix would not talk specifics on Weaver if she is working with

law enforcement or if she gave a reason. he did say he'd like to stress the significance of the safe harbor law, allowing mothers to drop off newborns to hospitals or law enforcement agencies. What do we know? Levi Page, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. What makes authorities believe the baby was born alive? Because of the way that the child died, asphyxiation, Nancy, it was suffocated. This little baby was suffocated. Joining me, Dr. Michelle Dupree, South Carolina medical examiner, author of Homicide Investigation Field Guide. Dr. Dupree, how can you tell if a baby was still born if it just for instance and i don't think this is what happened died of sids or if it was asphyxiated what nancy that's exactly why we do autopsies

even on babies and infants and what we would look at is under the microscope we would take small sections of the infant's lung and we can tell by looking at them under a microscope if the lung has ever had air in it. If the baby's lungs have been filled with air, then the baby was born alive and took a breath. Otherwise, the baby may have been stillborn. So it's just that simple look at its lungs. And when you say you can look at the lungs and tell the baby has breathed air, what do you see? I'm just curious. Well, we actually see the architecture of the lung. There are things called alveoli that hold air. There's sacs in the lung tissue itself. When the baby is inside the womb and before taking a breath, those sacs are collapsed and they're not inflated. When the baby is born, takes the first breath, those sacs then become air-filled,

and you can see that under the microscope. That they have at least at some point become inflated? Correct. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Sheriff's investigators say they got a call from university police just after 9 Wednesday night, reporting the discovery of the body of a newborn outside this sorority house on Lakeside Drive. The sheriff's office says it's a difficult case to investigate. You always have a soft spot in your heart

for babies and children, and you never want to see anybody go through this. Investigators say if the autopsy shows the baby found here was stillborn, the mother could still face criminal charges for discarding the body. Ohio's Safe Haven law allows either birth parent to surrender a baby within 30 days of birth to any emergency room, law enforcement officer, or firefighter.

No questions asked. Those are our friends WBNS CBS 10 TV. That was Maureen Cocott speaking to Levi Page, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. Is it true that Emily Weaver stated the baby actually moved? Yes. In an interview that she gave with police, she said that she cut her umbilical cord with a knife and then placed her newborn, who she said was moving, and she admitted it was alive in a trash bag. Take a listen to what we learn from Emily Weaver herself. 21-year-old Emily Weaver. Prosecutors say she gave birth in her sorority house at

Muskingum University last year, then put the baby in a trash bag and left it outside. Weaver testified she thought the baby was already dead. She could face life in prison. Our friends at ABC 6 Columbus, I want you to hear this. Head down and hands cuffed. Emily Weaver appeared for the first time before a judge to fight accusations that could put her in prison for life. Your Honor, this morning I filed a plea of not guilty by race that would seem to be as well as to be not guilty. Though Weaver's attorney spoke in front of a packed courtroom, he did not return NBC4's request for an interview to share Weaver's side of the story. Wednesday, his client was arraigned on four counts surrounding the death of her newborn daughter last spring. The Muskingum

County coroner says the child only lived for a few hours before dying from asphyxiation. Her body was found in a plastic bag outside Weaver's sorority house. Prosecutors say she acted alone, but will not go into detail about who else knew she was pregnant. You're hearing our friends at NBC4. That was Columbus reporter Liz Adeola. It's way too much to take in. I'm not understanding the facts as we know them Levi Page CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter what can you tell me about texts that Emily Weaver sent before the baby was found dead she sent text Nancy to a boyfriend of hers from her high school days. And in the text, she says, I got rid of it. And he said, how do you know? And she says, it's been taken care of, talking about her pregnancy.

Well, that brings into mind why the boyfriend wasn't charged. Is the boyfriend or the father of the baby charged, Levi Levi Page or just the mother just the mother and Nancy DNA tests were later done on that high school boyfriend and it was ruled out he was not the father of that child well he may not be the father of the child but if he was part of the planning to kill the baby that makes him an accomplice to murder I don't know if there was enough evidence to prove that. He has not been charged and certainly if he was, would claim not guilty. With me, Kathleen Murphy, family lawyer who has literally seen it all. Kathleen Murphy,

what do you make of the fact that only the mom was prosecuted? I think they don't have the evidence to prosecute anybody else, Nancy. And I think that she was also telling different people that she had this baby, not just the boyfriend, but another man she was having sex with knew about the baby. Neither one of them were with her on a daily basis or a regular basis or involved in her day-to-day life during the pregnancy. We are talking about the case of Emily Weaver, who was then a student at university, a sorority member there at Delta Gamma Theta. When a baby is found outside in a trash can, the house manager said she asked Emily if she was pregnant and Emily told her she was not. We also know that later Emily says she, quote, tricked herself into believing the birth would never happen. What does that mean to Dr. Karen Stark, New York psychologist?

That's what we were talking about, what I mentioned to you earlier, Nancy, where the person is in denial. So it's not really in their consciousness. Sometimes they realize they're pregnant, but they're able to suppress it and tell themselves, this isn't really happening to me. And they don't attach with the baby. They don't admit that they're pregnant. They conceal it, and they've convinced it. It's like they've tricked their mind into believing this is not something that's real. So can you do that? Can you trick yourself into believing it's not real?

Yes. There are too many instances where this has occurred, and you see it happening over and over again not that they're innocent but they can't deal with the fact the shame the embarrassment the the idea that what what can they do about the baby family friends they just they're lost and they don't want the baby and don't know how to handle the situation. And so they tell themselves it's kind of like Scarlett O'Hara saying, you know, I'll think about it tomorrow. They say, this isn't real. This isn't really happening to me. Now, Emily said that she confided in her boyfriend, but that he, quote, wanted no part in it it which would probably rule him out as being an accomplice she does also say that they drove to an abortion clinic but on their way were turned

around by highway patrol because a winter storm was coming so she did know that there were alternatives also she had been concealing her tummy in baggy clothes, including T-shirts and hoodies. Long story short, she knew enough to try to cover up the pregnancy. I'm trying to figure out how the prosecutor managed to prove that the baby had once been alive and breathed, according to our guest, Dr. Michelle Dupree, they could very simply look at what's called the alveoli sacs inside the lungs that expand once breaths have been taken. I'm very curious about what happened at trial. I know this much. Take a listen to our friend Lee

Sheps at Inside Edition. A former college student who prosecutors say gave birth in her sorority house before leaving the baby to die in a trash can has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Emily Weaver police police say, had the baby girl in the bathroom at Muskingum University in Ohio back in April 2015, then stuffed her in a trash bag outside. A jury found Weaver guilty of murder in May. During sentencing, the 21-year-old told the court, quote, "'I stand before you a broken-down woman,

"'asking for forgiveness and mercy. Words cannot express how sorry I am to my beautiful daughter Addison, end quote. A judge told the court he didn't believe she was remorseful according to the Zaneville Times record pointing to evidence in the case from a text message that read, quote, taken care of. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.

A former college student who prosecutors say gave birth in her sorority house before leaving the baby to die in a trash can has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Emily Weaver police say had the baby girl in the bathroom at Muskingum University in Ohio back in April 2015, then stuffed her in a trash bag outside. A jury found Weaver guilty of murder in May. During sentencing, the 21-year-old told the court, quote, "'I stand before you a broken-down woman, "'asking for forgiveness and mercy. "'Words cannot express how sorry I am "'to my beautiful daughter Addison,' end quote. A judge told the court he didn't believe she was remorseful, according to the Zaneville Times record, pointing to evidence

in the case from a text message that read, quote, taken care of. The baby, quote, was taken care of. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Story. Now we know Emily Weaver, now 25, has been sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. Joining me, Bruce Johnson, owner of ISP Investigations, the Master Sergeant, Prime Scene Commander in Chicago Metro, retired. Bruce Johnson, how would they have proven this case? What evidence would they have been looking for? Well, the first thing is obviously the bathroom. Numerous girls had gone in there and I believe there was a text or something to the effect from the house mom that said, whoever made a mess in the bathroom, you need to get in here and clean it up. So there was obviously blood evidence there.

So you have numerous girls in the sorority that, you know, seen that scene. And then you just trace it backwards, the garbage can, the trash bag, and work it backwards. But, yeah, there were plenty of people to know. It wasn't a question of where the scene was and who it was. I think they were on it fairly quickly. You know, there are parallels to a recent case of Brooke Schuyler Richardson. If you will recall her, she was the cheerleader pictured very often in her red prom dress, a mermaid dress. Nobody seemed to notice she was pregnant.

I mean, I could tell when you wear a mermaid dress that fits tightly down to the knees, you can pretty much see everything. In that case, even though we know the baby was killed and buried under the family barbecue pit in the backyard, she, Brooke Skylar Richardson, walked free. To you, Kathleen Murphy, family lawyer, I don't think that a life sentence is too extreme for Emily Weaver, who murdered her defenseless baby by asphyxiation. The injustice is that so many other killers walk free. Complete injustice. And when that verdict came down, I was shocked. But in going through the records and looking at the decision that was made by the jury, the jury said that there was simply not evidence that the child was born alive, which is the difference between Skylar, Brooke Skylar

Richardson and Emily Weaver. Emily Weaver came straight out and said, my child was alive. Brooke Skylar Richardson did not confirm that this child was alive and in fact argued that it was stillborn so you think that's the big difference in this case as it compares to brooke schuyler richardson yes i do uh to you levi page crime online.com investigative reporter weigh in how come brooke schuyler richardson walks free and emily weaver gets life without parole. So Brooke Richardson, Nancy, it was two months after she gave birth that the baby's skeletal remains were found in a shallow grave and placed on top of that was a flower that she had put on top of the grave. And Nancy, in that case, they said that it was a stillbirth and that she did not intentionally murder her child like the defendant in the case that we're talking about here. Who said it was a stillbirth?

That's what she had claimed, and that is what her defense argued. They had an expert, a forensic expert, that argued for her and testified on her behalf at trial. To our senior producer, Jackie Howard. Jackie, weigh in. Nancy, one of the big issues in that case of Skylar Richardson was whether or not her newborn was burned alive versus being stillborn, as Skylar told police. Skylar Richardson's attorneys claim Richardson never burned the baby, blasting a forensic anthropologist who told the prosecution that the baby had been burned.

When inspecting the rib bones, a forensic anthropologist noticed that the ends of the bones were darker than the rest, and police were told that Richardson had burned the baby. Now, the forensic pathologist who performed the autopsy testified there was no evidence of burning. Richardson did tell police that as she buried the baby, tried to set the baby on fire. Again, that she believed that the baby was stillborn and not alive. The detective wrote in his report that Richardson said she lit her baby's foot on fire with a lighter. The flames reached the baby's chest before Richardson put them out. This is what Richardson told police in her second interview.

In the end, Skylar Richardson was found not guilty of murdering her newborn baby. You know, very often we hear stories like Emily Weaver's, but usually the cases do not end with sentences of life without parole. Levi Page, what made this judge give Weaver Elwop life without parole? Well, he claimed that she had engaged in bad behaviors while she was pregnant. She drank alcohol. She even signed up and played in a dodgeball tournament, Nancy, while she was pregnant. And in the letter that she was reading to the court on the day that she was being sentenced, where she

was begging for mercy, the judge scolded her and said it was I, I, I, me, me, me, and not anything about the baby that was killed. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Prosecutors say 20-year-old Emily Weaver was a college sophomore who became a mom, and now she's accused of killing her child only hours after birth. The child was found in a plastic bag outside of a sorority house. Muskingum County Prosecutor Michael Haddock says the newborn girl died of asphyxiation and says the baby was born inside the Delta Gamma Theta house at Muskingum University in April, but would not say who else may have known about it.

There were other people that lived in the house. But you're not looking at charges against anyone else at this point? We are not. Haddix says DNA evidence confirmed the baby belonged to Weaver. Sheriff Matt Lutz acknowledged the case was emotional. We all wanted to make sure that we had all the facts and circumstances to present to Mr. Haddix to make sure that we were treating everybody fairly. You're hearing our friends at ABC6. That's news reporter Mike McCarthy along with the prosecutor Michael Haddix. 20-year-old Emily Weaver gives

birth to a baby girl Addison inside the sorority house in the library bathroom, puts the baby in a garbage bag, leaves the baby in an outside trash can outside the sorority house. The prosecutor says others in the house are not suspected of knowing about the baby, although they all clearly were suspicious and had been talking about it for weeks before the baby was killed. That does not mean they are part of the death. To Bruce Johnson, owner of ISP Investigations, Bruce, very often we see stories about babies being killed by moms. We don't normally see life without the possibility of parole. Why do you think this case is different? Well, I don't think it's different, but I just think that the case is that

she has been showing no remorse. You had questions about, did she know about the pregnancy or was she trying to suppress it? As far as the girlfriends, everybody that asked her if she was pregnant, you know, there was another pregnant. Once she said, no, she didn't want to ask her again because she didn't want to say that she's getting fat. So you have all these, you know, normal conversations with girls in a sorority. And, you know, I don't think any of them knew, you know, obviously at the date and time that she, they had suspicions that she was pregnant, but no one could prove it. So when she gave birth that day, I don't think any knew of it and had any evidence from the police.

So I don't think any of them should be charged. But yeah, I mean, being out here in Cook County and seeing this with no chance of parole is, that's a shocker. He really missed the, felt that her no remorse during the trial, which, you know, we weren't sitting in, he really had to come down on that issue. That had to be the main issue, that she was showing no remorse and that she knew because the baby moved that it was actually alive.

And she could have, at that point, taken action to save the baby rather than disposing it cold-heartedly. So I think those are the factors that led to his decision. To our senior producer Jackie Howard, Jackie weigh in. Prosecutors tried to show during the trial that Weaver never intended to have this child. The prosecutors argued that Weaver smoked pot, played sports, and took labor-inducing supplements throughout her pregnancy, hoping she'd have a miscarriage. Part of the evidence that the prosecutors used was 80 pills of black cohosh. It's a supplement that comes in a bottle that has written in big letters on there the warning,

do not take if pregnant, and Weaver had been taking that within 16 days of giving birth. So in my mind, to you, Kathleen Murphy, family lawyer joining us out of North Carolina, Kathleen, it sounds like her plan all along was to get rid of the baby. Hands down. And especially after she sent that text to the man the problem's taken care of it was clearly an intentional act to get rid of this child the problem and be not in denial nancy but just refusing to accept the responsibilities for the situation that she found herself into our friends joining us from inside addition a former college student who prosecutors say gave birth in her sorority house before

leaving the baby to die in a trash can has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole Emily Weaver police say had the baby girl in the bathroom at Muskingum University in Ohio back in April 2015, then stuffed her in a trash bag outside. A jury found Weaver guilty of murder in May. During sentencing, the 21-year-old told the court, quote, I stand before you a broken down woman, asking for forgiveness and mercy.

Words cannot express how sorry I am to my beautiful daughter Addison, end quote. A judge told the court he didn't believe she was remorseful, according to the Zaneville Times record, pointing to evidence in the case from a text message that read, quote, taken care of. So basically, I got rid of it. Me, me, me. I, I, I. This baby weighed six pounds. Joining me, Kathleen Murphy, North Carolina family lawyer. You can find her at ncdomesticlaw.com. Kathleen Murphy, again, many people are outraged that she got life without parole. Can you justify the sentence?

And she's already been denied appeal. What are the chances she will win on another appeal? Well, in fact, Nancy, there was an appeal that she had won in 2018 so that the issue of neonatal side, I'm not pronouncing that right, but neoside could be brought before the jury so that her sentence could be reevaluated. She lost that appeal or she won that appeal and had a trial and she put in a box by the prosecutor and found to be extremely biased in her testimony. And the information that was testified to was clearly a biased amount of testimony from the expert. She's not getting out. Life without possibility of parole. It was a very,

very appropriate sentence. This was a six and a half pound baby girl. Six and a half pounds, known to be alive at birth. An appeals court has upheld the conviction of Emily Weaver, a former Muskingum University student serving life without parole after being convicted of killing her newborn baby girl. Now, she was found guilty by a jury of aggravated murder, abuse of a corpse, two counts tampering with evidence. Accused of placing the baby in a garbage can after giving birth, then wrapping it in a trash bag and leaving it outside the sorority house on campus. The baby died of asphyxiation, according to preliminary autopsy reports. To Dr. Michelle Dupree, how can you look at a body and know the person died of asphyxiation? Nancy, there's several ways you can do that. You can

oftentimes find petechiae, which are small little pinpoint hemorrhages even on the surface of the skin. Depends on how the person, the baby, was asphyxiated. Was it smothered with a pillow? Was it strangled? Those things are going to appear in different parts of the baby, but we look at things like that. Guys, we know that the district court judges found that Emily Weaver's other actions were important. Blatant disregard for law enforcement and the justice system and her attempt to dispose of the baby, other evidence of the murder, psychological repercussions her behaviors likely had on the campus community. I'm more concerned about the baby itself myself, as far as I'm concerned. But also, it was argued that because the baby died after being placed in the garbage bag,

Weaver was not guilty of abuse to corpse. But if you die of asphyxiation, I don't know, Dr. Michelle Dupree, could the baby have died in the garbage bag? Yes, absolutely that's possible. Anything that would cut off the air supply could certainly have caused the asphyxiation. We also know, to Kathleen Murphy, family lawyer, that in this jurisdiction, the life sentence is not anything that the court of appeals, that they don't have the jurisdiction to review Weaver's life sentence for aggravated murder. They can review other things, but not sentencing because that's set forth by the

legislature. That is correct. They did review other matters and she lost that review hearing. And so she is set firmly exactly where she needs to be life in prison without the possibility of parole ever the end. And thank God, because that baby had been absolutely murdered. The case now on appeal again, and we wait till justice unfolds. Nancy Grace, Crime Story, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.