Laken Snelling Pleads Guilty in Baby’s Death, Faces Recommended 10-Year Manslaughter Term
Updated
Updated · WKYT · Aug 21
Laken Snelling Pleads Guilty in Baby’s Death, Faces Recommended 10-Year Manslaughter Term
3 articles · Updated · WKYT · Aug 21
Summary
Laken Snelling admitted Friday to manslaughter, abuse of a corpse, tampering with evidence and concealing an infant’s birth, telling a Kentucky judge, “Instead of helping him, I ended his life.”
10 years was the Commonwealth’s recommended sentence on the manslaughter count, plus shorter terms on the other charges, though the judge can impose more; Snelling could then withdraw her plea.
August 2025 police found the baby boy dead in a closet on Park Avenue, wrapped in a towel inside a trash bag after roommates, suspicious of Snelling’s explanation for loud noises, searched her room.
The Kentucky Medical Examiner ruled the infant had been born alive and died of asphyxia by undetermined means; Snelling told the judge she bagged towels and never told anyone about the birth.
Oct. 16 is the sentencing date, ending a case in which Snelling had been indicted, briefly jailed and later placed on house arrest in Tennessee after bonding out.