Who Is Rachelle Bond? 'Baby Doe' Bella's Mother To Be Sentenced In Daughter's Murder
The mother of 2-year-old Bella Bond, better known as “Baby Doe,” was scheduled to be sentenced Tuesday, just a day after her former boyfriend was convicted in the death of her daughter. Rachelle Bond struck a plea deal prior to the trial that would allow her to be freed on time served at its conclusion in exchange for a guilty plea and testimony against her ex-boyfriend.
Suffolk County Superior County Judge Janet L. Sanders said in a hearing Tuesday she give final approval to the plea deal between Bond and prosecutors but that sentencing would be postponed until July 12. Bond would need to undergo treatment for drug addiction and there was currently no facility available for her to be transferred to.
Read: Everything We Know About The Bella Bond Trial As Closing Arguments Begin
“There’s no secret here about the sentence,” said Sanders, according to the Boston Globe.
Bond pleaded guilty to being an accessory in the murder in February when she admitted to helping her ex-boyfriend, Michael McCarthy, dispose of Bella’s body. McCarthy was found guilty of second-degree murder Monday, a charge that carries an automatic life sentence in Massachusetts.
The trial volleyed blame back and forth between McCarthy and Bond. Prosecutors argued that McCarthy was obsessed with the occult and believed Bond was a demon when he killed her. McCarthy’s defense team, on the other hand, said it was not he who was obsessed with the occult but Bond and that Bond had been the one to kill her daughter.
Bond told police she had seen McCarthy, who lived with her at the time of Bella’s death, kill her daughter by punching her over and over again in the stomach. She said she was intimidated into keeping quiet because McCarthy threatened her and forced her to help him dispose of Bella’s body. The two wrapped Bella’s body in trash bags loaded with weights and threw her in the water. The couple reportedly binged on heroin after Bella’s death, as they were both addicted to the drug. Bond said she was “trapped by [McCarthy’s] abusive behavior and her own drug abuse.”
Police found books about demolonology in the apartment McCarthy and Bond shared while searching it after the murder, though it was unclear who they belonged to. At one point in the trial, the defense quoted one of Bond’s diary entries in an attempt to prove that she was obsessed with the occult. In the entry, Bond discussed her views about why so many missing children were never found.
“That’s because the leaders every country get together and torture and rape and kill these innocent children every year just so they can drink their blood and eat their flesh,” the entry said. “So these reptilian demons can have a moments clarity.”
Read: Baby Doe Bella Bond Murder Trial Reveals Disturbing New Evidence
The case against McCarthy relied primarily on Bond’s testimony, which defense attorney’s attempted to refute as a “changing web of lies.”
“An innocent man is going to prison for the rest of his life for a crime that she committed,” defense attorney Jonathan Shapiro said Monday. Shapiro said he planned to appeal the conviction.
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