Wisconsin Newborn Found Dead With Gunshot Wounds; Teen Father Arrested

A 16-year-old boy was charged Tuesday with first-degree murder after his newborn baby was found dead with gunshot wounds.

Logan Kruckenberg-Anderson of Albany, initially reported to police that he had abandoned the newborn baby girl in the woods to die of exposure to cold. The police arrested him Sunday and charged him after the body of the infant was discovered.

The infant was born to his underage girlfriend at her home in Albany on Jan.5. On Saturday, the father of the teen mom complained to the police that Kruckenberg-Anderson took away the newborn and was not seen since then, reported local news outlet Wisconsin State Journal.

Kruckenberg-Anderson told the police that he gave his friend Tyler $60 for taking the newborn to an adoption agency in Madison and transferred the baby to him. However, he could not give further details about Tyler to the police. He said he met Tyler on Snapchat and could no longer reach him as he had blocked him.

In an interview with FBI agents on Sunday, Kruckenberg-Anderson admitted that he went to his girlfriend’s house on the day the baby was born and had discussed with her several options to get rid of the infant from their lives.

They finally decided to “get rid of the infant by simply dropping her somewhere,” according to the court documents, reported local news outlet Herald Sun. The teen dad took the baby in a backpack to his mother’s house where he put the little girl into a larger backpack and carried her to a wooded area. He said he could hear the infant crying during that time.

He then placed the child in a small snow-covered area inside a fallen tree. He initially told the investigators that he covered the baby’s naked body with snow and walked away leaving her to die in the cold.

The police discovered the child’s body from the spot he directed them to. But on examination, they realized that the child had a gunshot wound on her forehead and found a spent bullet casing near her body. They also recovered a second bullet casing inside the backpack that he used to carry the infant.

Kruckenberg-Anderson later admitted that she shot the baby twice after leaving her in the wooded area. The investigation revealed that the bullet casings were “consistent” with the gun the police recovered from Kruckenberg-Anderson’s friend several days after the shooting.

Kruckenberg-Anderson is also charged for hiding the corpse. He is scheduled to court for a preliminary hearing on Jan.20. He was ordered to remain imprisoned in lieu of $1million bail.

Under the Wisconsin state law, individuals above 10 years of age are charged as an adult when facing a first-degree homicide charge.