Crime

 

Woman convicted of murdering 8-month-pregnant woman whose baby she then cut out and passed off as her own

By Dave Andrusko

Julie Corey was found guilty of 1st degree murder in Worcester Superior Court in Worcester, Mass. Wednesday February 12, 2014. Ms. Corey, 39, was found guilty of murdering the 23-year-old Darlen Haynes, cutting the baby she was carrying from her womb and then trying to pass the newborn baby girl off as her own.
(Worcester Telegram & Gazette / Rick Cinclair)

After two days of deliberations, a Worcester Superior Court jury found Julie Corey guilty of beating and strangling her friend, 23-year-old Darlene Haynes, then cutting her baby girl from Haynes’ womb, and then telling her own boyfriend it was their child. Haynes was more than 8 months pregnant when she was murdered in 2009. The Associated Press reported that Corey “sobbed” when the verdict was announced Wednesday.

“It’s probably the most horrific case this office has ever seen in terms of facts,” District Attorney Joseph Early Jr. said in a statement after the verdict was handed down. “This woman was killed for her baby.”

Corey, 39, had miscarried three months before the murder, but she kept that a secret.
Ms. Haynes’ decayed body was discovered in a closet in her apartment on July 27, 2009, the Associated Press reported. She had been beaten in the head and strangled, her abdomen cut open, and her baby was gone.

Although Corey, her boyfriend Alex Dion, and Haynes’ baby were found two days later at a homeless shelter in New Hampshire, Corey’s lawyers said she played no role in Haynes’ slaying. Defense lawyer Michael Wilcox tried to persuade the jury that “Haynes’ boyfriend had committed the murder, then contacted Corey and her boyfriend to take the baby,” according to Masslive.com. According to John F. Hill

“Dion testified that Corey, whom he believed was pregnant at the time, called him on July 23, 2009, and told him she was giving Haynes a ride to a store. Later that night, Corey called him to say her water had broken and a friend was taking her to the hospital to give birth, Dion said.

“A couple of hours later, Corey called him again and said, ‘We had a baby,’ Dion testified. Dion said Corey arrived home the next morning with a baby.”

Sentencing is scheduled for next Tuesday. Corey faces the possibility of life in prison without parole for the first degree murder conviction. Wilcox said they plan to appeal the verdict.
Ms. Haynes’ girl, now 4, lives with her biological father.

Source: NRLC News