A mother in Alabama will spend the rest of her life in prison after she left her newborn to die in a dumpster because she said raising babies costs “too much money.”
Houston County Circuit Judge Henry D. Binford ordered Jakayla Ashanti Williams to serve life in a state correctional facility without the possibility of parole during a hearing on Monday, September 14.
Williams, 21, received her sentence after accepting an eleventh-hour deal to avoid the possibility of the death sentence. She pleaded guilty to one count of capital murder just moments before jury selection was scheduled to begin for her trial, according to WKRG.
The incident took place when Williams was 18 years old in August 2023. After secretly giving birth to the baby at her home in Dothan, Alabama, she told her family that she had surrendered the child to a “redheaded” employee at Southeast Health Medical Center, according to Law & Crime.
However, it became clear that she had lied when she went to the hospital with a family member days after the birth to claim she wanted to get the baby back. Hospital staff then contacted police, and Williams gave them a vague description of the employee she claimed had taken her baby.
Investigators then looked at hospital surveillance footage, which did not have any evidence of Williams being at the hospital after she gave birth to the child. The footage also did not show anyone resembling the employee she claimed to have given the baby.
Police spoke to Williams again, and she admitted to leaving the baby in a dumpster at an apartment complex near her home. Investigators went to the Dothan landfill and found the baby’s remains after the dumpster’s contents had been transported there. Police said the baby was wrapped in a mattress protector and placed inside a zipped duffel bag.
Williams explained to authorities that she did not want to be a mother at 18 and believed it “cost too much money” to have a child.
She was charged with capital murder, and prosecutors shared their plans to pursue the death penalty.
During a hearing later in 2023, Williams’ defense said there was a possibility the child was not alive when the defendant put him in the dumpster. The defense attorney also argued that Williams was young, had no criminal record and needed mental health treatment.
Williams’ attorneys pursued a mental health defense in the following years, and they reportedly argued that her age and emotional condition should be considered in the case.
“I’m shocked this is the case they chose to seek the death penalty,” Williams’ defense attorney, Aimee Cobb, told WTVY.
