Incestuous dad who shot, killed daughter abused her so much as a baby that her mother gave her up for adoption: Report

The former wife of a man who married his own daughter and had her baby apparently abused her so much as an infant that her mother ended up giving her up for adoption.

Mail Online reports that Alyssa Pladl, 37, ex-wife of Steven Pladl, 42, opened up on why she gave her oldest daughter, Katie, up for adoption when the girl was just a toddler. Earlier this year, Steven Pladl, who ended up reportedly marrying Katie in an illegal ceremony, shot her and their infant son, killing them both, before turning the gun on himself.

Alone and estranged from her family at age 17, Alyssa gave birth to Katie in 1998, with hopes of a good life for her daughter. She said her dreams were halted when Pladl began pinching their baby daughter so hard that he left black and blue marks on her skin. Further, Alyssa said her ex-husband would stuff the baby into a cooler when she cried, leaving her there so long that she almost suffocated.

“He would do things like cover her mouth when she would cry. He pinched her all over her body and turned her black and blue a couple of times. Eventually he said he couldn’t stand the screaming and crying anymore so he started to place her into a cooler or an ice chest. Sometimes he would put a blanket there to keep a crack open, sometimes he would shut it and wouldn’t let me go back to open it.”

Alyssa, fearing for the child’s safety, put the child up for adoption when she was a toddler, but Katie would eventually make her way back to her adoptive parents.

As CrimeOnline previously reported, Katie Rose Pladl was adopted in 1988, but when she turned 18, she started searching for her biological parents. In August 2016, after locating them online, she moved in with Alyssa and Steven Pladl and their two children in Richmond, Virginia. Three months later Alyssa moved out of the home, but Katie continued to live with her father.

Alyssa told police that shortly after Katie moved in, Pladl started sleeping in the floor of her room. In May 2017, Katie and her father moved to Knightdale, North Carolina. Around the same time, the wife read one of her children’s journals that indicated Katie was pregnant by her own father.

According to a police warrant, Pladl apparently told his other children to call Katie “stepmom” and admitted to his estranged wife that not only was he the father of his daughter’s baby, but that he planned to marry her. A recently-revealed Snapchat photo that made its way to an Instagram account, shows what appears to be dad and daughter in front of a pond, kissing. The female in the photo, reportedly Katie, looks visibly pregnant.

After an in-depth investigation, authorities obtained arrest warrants for both Katie and her father. When police arrested father and daughter, a baby boy, born in September 2017, was with them. Both suspects were arrested and taken to the Wake County Detention Center.

After father and daughter bailed out of jail, Katie apparently went back to her adoptive parents house, while Pladl was ordered to have no contact with her  Pladl ignored the order to stay away from his daughter-turned-wife and drove to New Milford, Connecticut,, where he snuck up on Katie and her adoptive father. He shot them both, killing them.

Prior to driving to Connecticutt, he drove to the North Carolina home where his infant son was living with his paternal grandmother. He shot the baby in the head, killing him instantly. Pladl later drove to New York and shot himself in the head. Authorities found his lifeless body inside of a pickup truck.

Alyssa told MailOnline that she met Pladl in an online chat room in 1995 when she was 15 and he was 20. She said he “groomed” her while she was young and although he abused her, she continued to live with him for over 20 years, eventually having more children with him. Alyssa likened their family home to the “house of horrors.” She was planning to finally separate from Pladl when Katie contacted them in 2016.

Alyssa said she was overjoyed when Katie decided to come live with them, but the happiness turned to shock and sadness when one of her younger children told her that Pladl demanded they refer to Katie as their stepmother.

Soon after, Katie became pregnant and dad and daughter held a wedding ceremony with Katie’s adoptive parents and Pladl’s mother in attendance.

Alyssa described Pladyl’s death as a relief and although he was the father of her two children, she has no plans to mourn him or carry out a memorial for him.

“It’s such a relief that I don’t have to look over my shoulder anymore to see if Steve is there. Every single day I’ve played out in my head: what if he’s in the back of my Jeep getting ready to shoot me. Sometimes I had such horrible paranoia that I had to stop whatever I was doing and drive home to make sure everything was OK.”

[Feature Photo: Steven and Katie Pladl/Police Handout]