A Minnesota woman who admitted to leaving her newborn son to die near the Mississippi River two decades ago has been sentenced to 27 years in prison.
Jennifer Matter, of Belvidere Township, outside Red Wing, was convicted Friday of second-degree murder, CBS Minnesota reported. He pleaded guilty in January to leaving the baby on the riverbank in 2003.
She was not arrested until May 10, 2022, after DNA tests linked her to the boy, authorities said.
“Genetic genealogy and rapid DNA testing were used to develop a break in the case and then quickly confirm the identity of the babies’ mother,” Bureau of Criminal Investigation Superintendent Drew Evans said after Matter was arrested. “These kinds of scientific breakthroughs that can help investigations are happening all the time. That’s why it’s so important to never give up on any unsolved case.”
Prosecutors have said DNA evidence also links Matter to a girl found dead in Mississippi in 1999, but she has not been charged in that case.
According to the criminal complaint, Matter said she hoped someone would find the boy alive after she dropped him off.
Teenagers found the boy’s body on December 7, 2003 in Frontenac, on the shores of Lake Pepin, a body of water on the Mississippi River.
In 2021, the Minnesota BCA Crime Lab was able to determine and identify the biological father of the baby found in 1999 and worked to establish Matter as a person of interest. Investigators interviewed her in late April, and she denied knowing anything about either case. When they took samples of his DNA sample in a search warrant last week, he again denied knowing about any of the babies.
In a third interview with investigators, Matter told them that in 1999 she was “in and out of jail, drinking too much, doing a lot of stupid things” and that she didn’t know she was pregnant until she started bleeding. while going to drop off two other children at school and daycare.
She said she later gave birth at home in her bathroom and was “scared” when she saw the baby was born “blue, not breathing and not crying”. He said he knew he should have sought help but “his mind wasn’t there”. She wrapped the baby and, possibly a day later, left the baby’s body in Bay Point Park in the middle of the night.
She told investigators she didn’t remember a second baby, but later said she “was in Frontenac” and said she was “almost positive” she was alone on a public beach when she went into labor. She “was trying to pull over because she had a warrant for her arrest and she believed the police were looking for her.” She said she couldn’t remember if the baby was crying, but said she was breathing well.
She said she left the baby on the beach before she left, and said she had no plans to leave the baby somewhere safe, but was “hoping that someone from the nearby houses would find the baby.”
