In a Fayette County courtroom, a 22-year-old former college athlete named Laken Snelling stood before a judge and admitted to ending the life of her newborn son — a child born unexpectedly, whose brief existence was hidden, and whose death was followed by silence. The case, rooted in a moment of panic in August 2024 and now resolved through a guilty plea to first-degree manslaughter, asks the harder questions that courts are rarely equipped to fully answer: how fear and unpreparedness become irreversible, and how society weighs tragedy against culpability. Snelling faces up to ten years in pri
UK student pleads guilty in infant death case
One newborn infant died; the child was found deceased inside a trash bag in a closet after being deprived of oxygen by the mother.
Instead of helping him, I ended his life and afterward I cleaned up
Mark
Why did she change her plea? Was there new evidence, or did something shift in how she understood what happened?
Mimi
Her attorney approached prosecutors about accepting a guilty plea. The grand jury had already indicted her for first-degree manslaughter, and both sides agreed to move forward on that charge. It wasn't about new evidence—it was about her taking responsibility for what she'd done.
Mark
The timeline is strange. She gave birth, fell asleep on the baby, woke up to find him turning blue. How much time passed between when she realized he was dead and when she wrapped him up?
Mimi
The documents don't specify. What we know is that she was awake for about thirty minutes after birth before she fell asleep. When she woke, the baby was already showing signs of death. After that, she wrapped him and lay beside him for a while. Then she went about her day—told roommates she was going to a doctor, got food, went to the clinic. Hours may have passed.
Mark
She deleted the pregnancy photos. That suggests she knew what she'd done was wrong and was trying to hide it.
Mimi
Yes. But it's also worth asking what was happening in her mind. Was she in shock? Was she trying to convince herself it hadn't happened? The court documents show she told people she fainted from not eating—a partial truth, maybe, or a way of explaining her distress without revealing the real reason.
Mark
Ten years is the maximum. Do you think she'll get that?
Mimi
That's for the judge to decide at sentencing. The facts are brutal—a baby died, and she caused it. But the circumstances—the hidden pregnancy, the youth, the apparent panic—may weigh on how the sentence is handed down. We won't know until that hearing happens.
Mark
What strikes you most about her statement in court?
Mimi
That she said "instead of helping him, I ended his life." She didn't blame circumstances or claim ignorance. She named the choice she made, or the choice she didn't make—to get help. That clarity, even in tears, is what makes the case so difficult to look away from.
The Pulse
- A newborn was found cold and lifeless inside a trash bag in a Lexington closet on August 27, 2024 — a discovery that set in motion one of the most quietly devastating criminal cases in recent Kentucky memory.
- Snelling's own account revealed a cascade of choices made in panic: falling asleep on the infant, believing him dead, wrapping him, going to McDonald's, driving to a clinic she never entered, and erasing all digital evidence of the pregnancy.
- In court, she offered no deflection — only a tearful admission that she was overwhelmed, did not seek help, ended her son's life, and then cleaned up and told no one.
- Prosecutors accepted a guilty plea to first-degree manslaughter after a grand jury indictment, collapsing a multi-charge case into a single, grave acknowledgment of what occurred.
- Sentencing has not yet been scheduled, leaving unresolved the question of how the courts will measure ten possible years against the fear, denial, and irreversible loss at the heart of this case.
In a Fayette County courtroom, a 22-year-old former college athlete named Laken Snelling stood before a judge and admitted to ending the life of her newborn son — a child born unexpectedly, whose brief existence was hidden, and whose death was followed by silence. The case, rooted in a moment of panic in August 2024 and now resolved through a guilty plea to first-degree manslaughter, asks the harder questions that courts are rarely equipped to fully answer: how fear and unpreparedness become irreversible, and how society weighs tragedy against culpability. Snelling faces up to ten years in prison, while the child she bore and buried in a closet remains the still center of a story still unfolding.
Laken Snelling, a 22-year-old former University of Kentucky STUNT team athlete, stood in a Fayette County courtroom on Friday and changed her plea to guilty in the death of her newborn son. When the judge asked how she had ended the baby's life, she answered plainly: "I deprived him of oxygen."
The child's remains had been discovered on August 27, 2024, inside a black trash bag in a closet in Lexington, after officers responded to reports of an unresponsive infant. Snelling was arrested days later. Her account to investigators described an unexpected birth, a newborn she believed was alive, and then — after she fell asleep on top of him — waking to find the child turning blue and purple.
What followed was a series of choices made in isolation and fear. She wrapped the baby's body and lay beside it, she said, because it gave her comfort. She told her roommates she had fainted from not eating. She went to McDonald's. She drove to a student health clinic and did not go inside. She deleted photos and erased evidence of the pregnancy from her phone.
In court, Snelling spoke through tears. "I was under a lot of emotional stress and my baby came unexpectedly," she said. "And instead of helping him, I ended his life and afterward I cleaned up and didn't tell anyone." There were no excuses offered — only the weight of what she had done, stated plainly.
Commonwealth's attorney Kimberly Baird confirmed that Snelling's legal team had initiated the change of course. A grand jury had already returned an indictment for first-degree manslaughter, and prosecutors accepted the plea. Snelling now faces up to ten years in prison. Sentencing has not yet been scheduled, and the harder question — how the courts will weigh her circumstances against her culpability — remains unanswered.
Laken Snelling stood in a Fayette County courtroom on Friday and told the judge what she had done. The 22-year-old former University of Kentucky athlete, a member of the school's STUNT team, changed her plea from not guilty to guilty on charges stemming from the death of her newborn son. When asked directly how she ended the baby's life, she answered: "I deprived him of oxygen."
The child's body had been found on August 27, 2024, inside a black trash bag in a closet in Lexington. Officers responding to reports of an unresponsive infant discovered the remains cold and lifeless. Snelling was arrested days later. The case that followed would reveal a sequence of events marked by panic, denial, and a young woman overwhelmed by circumstances she felt unprepared to face.
According to court documents and her own account to investigators, Snelling gave birth unexpectedly. She told staff at the University of Kentucky hospital that she heard the newborn make a small sound at birth and "guessed" he was alive. The baby showed signs of fetal movement. But then Snelling fell asleep on top of the infant. When she woke thirty minutes later, the child was turning blue and purple. She believed he was dead.
What followed was a series of choices that compounded the tragedy. She wrapped the baby's body, she said, "like a burrito," and lay beside it because it "gave her comfort." She told her roommates she was going to see a doctor because she had fainted from not eating. She went to McDonald's. She drove to the student health clinic but did not go inside. She deleted labor photos from her phone and erased evidence of the pregnancy from her digital records.
In court, Snelling spoke through tears about the weight she had been carrying. "I was under a lot of emotional stress and my baby came unexpectedly," she said. "And instead of helping him, I ended his life and afterward I cleaned up and didn't tell anyone." The confession was stark and unadorned—no excuses offered, no attempt to minimize what had occurred.
Commonwealth's attorney Kimberly Baird explained that Snelling's legal team had approached prosecutors about changing course. A Fayette County grand jury had returned an indictment for first-degree manslaughter, and prosecutors accepted the guilty plea. The case had moved quickly from initial charges—abuse of a corpse, tampering with physical evidence, concealing the birth of an infant—to this single, grave admission.
Snelling now faces up to ten years in prison. Sentencing has not yet been scheduled. The case represents one of the most difficult intersections in the criminal justice system: a young woman, a hidden pregnancy, an unexpected birth, and a child who did not survive. What remains is the question of what comes next—how the courts will weigh her culpability against the circumstances that led to this moment, and what sentence might follow.
Notable Quotes
I was under a lot of emotional stress and my baby came unexpectedly. And instead of helping him, I ended his life and afterward I cleaned up and didn't tell anyone.— Laken Snelling, in court
I deprived him of oxygen.— Laken Snelling, answering the judge's question about how she ended the baby's life
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