A Minnesota woman is facing charges after allegedly drowning her baby and throwing his body in a dumpster.
According to the charges, Minneapolis Police Department officers were called to the Children’s Hospital on March 6 on reports of a missing child.
Mother Told Cops the Child Died of Natural Causes in the Hospital
A criminal complaint obtained by KARE11, states that upon arrival at the hospital, officers found 20-year-old Esperanza Harding, who claimed her child died of natural causes in the hospital on March 1. However, the hospital had no record of the child being admitted or dying in the hospital and the medical examiner’s office had no record of the child.
According to the criminal complaint, Harding allegedly provided the officers with inconsistent information, but officials said she finally went on to admit the child died in a Bloomington Hotel on Feb. 28.
The complaint states Harding told the officers that she was trying to take a bath on Feb 28. when the baby began crying. The crying child upset Harding and she allegedly drowned the boy, before taking a picture of his body in the tub, which was recovered from her phone.
After the boy’s death, Harding told officers she wrapped up his body, put it in a backpack and threw it in a dumpster, the complaint states.
Harding Texted the Man She was Dating, ‘He’s Going to Not Be Here Much Longer’
In a later interview with the Bloomington Police cited in the complaint, Harding claimed that the man she was dating, Edwin Trudeau, didn’t like her child and he wanted her to put the boy up for adoption.
She allegedly texted Trudeau throughout the incident, including a message that read, “I’m about to do something bad, Please answer me, He’s going to not be here much longer.”
Trudeau visited Harding after the boy had been killed but did not call the authorities, according to his separate charging documents. He is charged as an accomplice in the incident.
