A 20-year-old Florida college student was arrested Friday after her newborn baby was found buried in a shallow grave behind her house.
The Flagler County Sheriff’s Office said a 911 call came in at around 4 a.m. requesting a welfare check on Anne Mae Demegillo of Palm Coast. The caller said they’d gotten messages from Demegillo saying that “she had secretly been pregnant and had unexpectedly given birth at home.”
“The message indicated that Demegillo’s baby was born alive and crying, but Demegillo had done something to the infant,” the sheriff’s office said.
Deputies arrived at the home and met with Demegillo, who said she wasn’t sure that she was pregnant but began experiencing severe abdominal pain early Thursday morning and gave birth in the bathroom toilet.
The baby had been crying but stopped, she said.
She told deputies to put in the newborn in a duffel bag in her closet “and went about her normal daily routine,” which on Thursday night included a theater performance in New Smyrna Beach. When she came home, she said, she decided to bury the infant in the backyard.
Demegillo never contacted emergency services, and detectives determined that she “knowingly and purposefully allowed the newborn to drown in the toilet.”
“This is a heartbreaking tragedy for our community, for the family involved, and an emotionally difficult case for our team,” said Sheriff Rick Staly. “I want to remind our community, especially our expectant mothers: Florida law allows you to bring a child at birth to a local fire station, hospital or law enforcement agency and surrender the child. That is a much better solution than what we are investigating today — for everyone involved.”
Investigators said the baby girl weighed nearly 3 1/2 pounds and measured 19 inches long, WKMG reported. They believe Demegillo’s mother, who lived at the home, did not know she was pregnant. The baby’s father’s whereabouts are unknown.
Demegillo has been charged with aggravated manslaughter of a child.
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[Featured image: Anne Demegillo/Facebook]