New-born baby killer gets life
A New York woman who killed two of her new-borns and encased their bodies in concrete was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison.
Stacy DeBeer, aged 30, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder two weeks ago in exchange for two consecutive sentences of 15 years to life in prison – meaning she will serve 30 years before she can seek parole.
“My babies deserved more,” DeBeer, weeping and shaking, said at her sentencing yesterday. “I will live with this everyday.”
Before dawn on May 11, 2003 – Mother’s Day and her 29th birthday – DeBeer said she gave birth on her living-room couch, placed the infant girl in a garbage bag and hid the body.
She told police she killed another newborn, also a girl, five years earlier.
DeBeer told relatives she was pregnant last year. When a baby failed to materialise, a relative snooping around the basement of DeBeer’s home in Farmington found the dead newborn encased in concrete in a plastic pail.
The other child’s body was found in a bucket of concrete left in a garden shed at DeBeer’s former home in Canadice, another rural town in western New York.
DeBeer’s 32-year-old husband, Brian, was charged with hindering prosecution by helping hide the first infant in June 1998. His trial could be held next month.
The couple have an 8-year-old son and a 7-year-old daughter who are being cared for by relatives.
