She Threw Her Baby Into a Swarm of Fire Ants
On November 29, 1998, Roy Black and his wife Ima were collecting aluminum cans in dumpsters in the Southeast Texas city of Beaumont, just 28 miles west of the Louisiana border. While searching in a dumpster on Park and Florida streets next to an apartment complex, Roy made a grim discovery. Inside of a black plastic trash bag was the body of a newborn baby boy. Duct tape was placed over the baby’s mouth, and his arms were secured across his chest with the same tape. The bag was littered with fecal matter, which covered the baby’s backside and legs. Ima alerted the police, who responded to the scene. The little boy was dubbed Baby Hope, and it was later found that he had died from asphyxiation. Police were able to obtain a palm print from the trash bag and a fingerprint from the duct tape, but since there was no match in the Automatic Fingerprint Identification System, Baby Hope’s case soon went cold.
Fast forward to June 6, 2003. 83-year-old Andrew Durham was taking an early morning walk down Hillebrandt Road located in Beaumont, south of the city proper. There in a roadside ditch, he spotted a baby girl. She was still alive and covered in fire ants. The venom from hundreds of fire ant stings was causing her seizures. Now, if you’ve ever experienced a sting from these guys, you know even for an adult these can be intense, but this was a little baby, so this situation could easily be fatal. This tiny baby girl required a blood transfusion and was hospitalized for nearly a month, but luckily, she pulled through. And thanks to an anonymous tip, this little girl who survived such a horrific encounter soon had a name, and so did her mother. The baby’s name was Paris, and her mother, Kenisha Berry.
Kenisha Berry was born December 26, 1977. She was described by her family as a timid and weary youngster. As a teenager, she dropped out of high school and obtained her GED, later becoming a prison guard in the city of Dayton, located between the cities of Beaumont and Houston, Texas. Supervisors of the Dayton prison noted that she was a hard worker, but her attendance was lacking. After being a no-call, no-show on several occasions, she was fired after four months. Later, she went on to work in food service and at a daycare center where she took care of toddlers, the latter closing in 2003.
On June 12, 2003, six days after Baby Paris’s near-fatal discovery, Kenisha walked into the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office and told the deputies that she was her mother. She also shared with them a tip that completely changed the course of their investigation. Paris was initially wrapped in a pillowcase. After abandoning her on the side of Hillebrandt Road, she threw away the pillowcase in a dumpster located at the Florida Park Apartments—the same dumpster in which Baby Hope was found five years earlier. Deputies knew they had more than just an abandonment case on their hands; they had finally cracked a cold case homicide.
Investigator Debbie Beavers of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department brought this information to the attention of Officer John Bowles of the Beaumont Police Department. Together, the two compared Kenisha’s prints to those that were found on the trash bag and the duct tape in the Baby Hope case. The palm print on the trash bag matched Kenisha’s right palm, and the fingerprint on the duct tape matched Kenisha’s left index finger. DNA testing of Baby Hope’s blood and oral swabs taken from Kenisha indicated a 99.98% probability that Kenisha was the little boy’s mother.
On June 27, 2003, CPS worker Tracy Rideau met with Kenisha, who had been booked on the charges related to abandoning Baby Paris on the side of the road. Paris was taken into custody by CPS. However, Kenisha had a nine-year-old daughter named Jasmine, a seven-year-old daughter named Kirsten, and a three-year-old son named Joskin. Baby Paris was fathered by a man named Leonard Carrier, and the three older surviving kids were fathered by a man named Joskin Love. At the first jail meeting, Rideau and Kenisha discussed the removal of Jasmine, Kirsten, and Joskin, and the potential for a family placement.
Rideau met with Kenisha in jail again on July 10, 2003, after the mother had been charged with capital homicide in the death of her son, Malachi, known to authorities as Baby Hope. Rideau asked Kenisha if her family knew anything about Malachi or other hidden pregnancies because their knowledge would affect the placement of her other kids. Kenisha advised Rideau that she knew how to hide a pregnancy and that her weight fluctuated a lot. She insisted that her family had absolutely nothing to do with Baby Hope or what was going on. Kenisha did not give Rideau any details about the duct tape other than she acknowledged that she had duct tape lying around the house. She did not confess that she had killed Malachi but stated that she had borrowed her grandmother’s car, placed the baby—whom she claimed was already inside the trash bag—in the trunk, and transported him to a dumpster without anybody’s knowledge. She insisted that her baby was not kicking, moving, or anything of that nature when she put him in the dumpster.
Kenisha testified at trial that she did not kill her baby. She knew that she was pregnant in 1998, but she did not know how far along she was. The father of the baby was a man named Nicholas Beard. Kenisha did not tell her family or anyone else about her pregnancy. She gave birth at home by herself and named the baby Malachi. He appeared to be healthy when he was born, and she fed him milk from a bottle. Her other kids were with a relative at the time of his birth, and when they returned home, she explained that she was watching a friend’s baby. His nose started running the next day, and she went to the store that morning to buy more milk. When she returned from the store, he was still asleep on the bed in her bedroom. Kenisha laid on the couch to watch television and later checked on him because she was concerned that he had not yet awakened. When she went into the bedroom, Malachi was limp and was not moving or breathing. She realized that he was dead but did not call for help because she was scared and did not know if it was against the law to give birth to a baby at home.
According to Kenisha, she put duct tape over his arms because they were stiff and kept sticking out, and she wanted them in front of him. She also put duct tape over his mouth because it bothered her that his mouth was open. She then left her apartment with Malachi in a bag and later placed him in a dumpster. The prosecution questioned Kenisha in cross-examination regarding her infant daughter Paris. She acknowledged that she hid her pregnancy with Paris but avoided answering questions about whether or not she had abandoned Paris on the side of the road. While evidence of other crimes is not admissible to prove the character of a person, it may be admissible for other purposes, such as proof of motive. The state argued that the subsequent hidden pregnancy and abandonment of Paris showed that Kenisha was keeping the children fathered by Joskin Love and discarding the children fathered by other men, thus demonstrating her motive and her intent to kill Malachi.
Forensic pathologist Tommy Brown had performed the autopsy on Malachi, and he estimated that he was two to five days old. Duct tape had been used to cover his mouth and to constrain his arms around his abdomen, and he had been placed inside a plastic trash bag. His stomach contained a milk-like product, which indicated that he was fed before his death, and there was fecal matter inside the plastic trash bag. He had petechiae on the pleural surfaces of his lungs, which was consistent with oxygen deprivation. The combination of being duct-taped and covered with a plastic trash bag was also consistent with oxygen deprivation. Brown observed no indication of an infection or Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. He determined that Malachi died from asphyxia due to smothering, and he ruled his death a homicide. Brown was of the opinion that the baby was still alive when he was placed inside the plastic trash bag, and that as he died, there was a large release of fecal material. Lividity of the anterior and posterior sides of the body led him to conclude that Malachi was lying on his stomach when he died, and after he was discovered, he was turned over and placed on his back for a short period of time.
The defense’s expert witness, forensic pathologist Stephen Pustilnik, testified that he reviewed Brown’s autopsy report, which included photographs and microscopic slides that were taken at the autopsy. He observed multiple areas of meconium aspiration in the microscopic slides of Malachi’s lungs, and he criticized Brown for failing to include the assessment of the microscopic slides in his autopsy report. “I’m the chief medical examiner for Fort Bend County, which means that we are responsible for certifying the cause and manner of death of people who die under suspicious, unnatural, and unlawful circumstances.” Meconium is the first stool of a newborn. Meconium Aspiration Syndrome occurs when a newborn breathes a mixture of meconium and amniotic fluid into the lungs around the time of delivery. Meconium Aspiration Syndrome, which can cause severe illness and death in the newborn, occurs in about 5% to 10% of births. It typically occurs when the fetus is stressed during labor, especially when the baby is past its due date. He believed that the baby released meconium from his bowels while experiencing fetal distress prior to birth, which later caused significant pneumonia. This would explain that Malachi was not only very sick but sick enough to die.
He also observed petechiae on the surface of Malachi’s lungs but stated this was a non-specific finding and should never be used as proof of anything. He testified that the duct tape on Malachi’s mouth would not necessarily cause asphyxia because most babies are nose breathers. However, he acknowledged that the plastic trash bag could have caused asphyxia. He did not think that the fecal matter inside of the plastic trash bag was indicative of the time of death because defecation could have occurred either at the time of death or after. Nor did he think that Malachi was struggling in the bag when the fecal matter was released because the feces was confined to his buttocks, his lower back, and the back of his foot. Pustilnik could not specifically conclude what caused the death of Baby Malachi. He acknowledged the possibility of homicide by asphyxia but testified that the baby could have died naturally prior to being placed in the bag. He had two good guesses as to why the baby died: one is natural, and one is homicide. He testified that it’s just as likely that Malachi died of a natural cause as it is that he died of homicide.
Another expert witness for the defense, Carl Hunt, who was a medical doctor specializing in pediatrics and neonatology, also reviewed the autopsy report and accompanying photographs. He testified that the duct tape on the baby’s mouth would not have caused suffocation, as young babies prefer to breathe through their noses. He believed that fecal material inside the plastic trash bag was insignificant because the release of fecal material could have occurred at any time. He agreed that petechiae in Malachi’s lungs could have developed due to oxygen deprivation but stated that petechiae are not proof of any particular mode of death and are very common in autopsies of young babies who die in unexplained situations. Hunt could not reach a conclusion as to how or why this baby died until he spoke to Pustilnik, who informed him that he had discovered the presence of meconium in the microscopic slides of Malachi’s lungs. After Pustilnik told him this, Hunt concluded that Malachi died of natural causes related to birth asphyxia and Meconium Aspiration Syndrome—in other words, lung failure.
The state recalled Brown after the testimony of Pustilnik and Hunt. Brown disagreed with Pustilnik’s findings of pneumonia or infection. He testified that he specifically looked at Malachi’s lungs during the autopsy. He stated, “Whenever I looked at the lungs, the alveolar spaces were open. There were a few squamous cells, which comes from the amniotic fluid, within the alveolar spaces. There was meconium that was described earlier; it has a yellow-brown pigment effect. So I did not realize there was any of that within the lungs. A pneumonia, you have to have neutrophils, which are white blood cells for bacterial infection, or you have lymphocytes, which indicate a viral infection. The baby had neither of those. I cannot call this a pneumonia.” Brown continued to believe that the cause of death was asphyxia due to smothering and a homicide.
The state presented evidence detailing Kenisha’s abandonment of her infant daughter Paris nearly five years after the death of Malachi. Andrew Durham testified that he heard a baby crying as he was walking along Hillebrandt Road in Jefferson County between 6:30 and 7:00 in the morning on June 6, 2003. He found Paris lying on her back in a ditch approximately 15 feet away from the road. She was unclothed, and she had fire ants all over her body. Durham alerted his wife, who was a nurse, and she took Paris to the hospital. Paris had extensive ant bites, and her eyes were swollen shut. She needed a blood transfusion and experienced seizures in the hospital.
Tracy Rideau testified that CPS was appointed as Paris’s managing conservator and that she was later placed in foster care. Rideau reported that Paris still had scars from the ant bites on her face, arms, and stomach. Investigator Debbie Beavers testified that Kenisha first told her that she wanted Joskin Love to take her to the hospital, but he instead drove them out to Hillebrandt Road and placed Paris on the ground. When Beavers informed her that Joskin had an alibi, she admitted that he was not involved. Beavers testified, “Her biggest concern when she was crying the first time I talked to her was that she was worried about what everybody was going to think, and what everybody would say, and how mad her mama was going to be at her for coming and talking to us.” Rideau testified that Kenisha’s two oldest kids, Jasmine and Kirsten, had been in counseling since their mother had been jailed on capital homicide. Jasmine had been diagnosed with PTSD. Rideau testified that Jasmine had expressed fear and wondered why her mother had done this to Malachi and Paris, and why she had not killed them.
The defense called Kenisha’s cousin, aunt, and mother. They testified that Kenisha was shy and respectful growing up and a loving and caring mother to Jasmine, Kirsten, and Joskin. They noted her behavior regarding Malachi and Paris was totally out of character. Kenisha’s cousin had reported that she had previously been employed at a fast-food restaurant, a prison, and a daycare facility. Kenisha’s aunt and cousin confirmed that she had hidden all but one of her pregnancies from her family. They said that Kenisha’s kids loved her and that it would negatively impact them if she received a death sentence.
The defense presented the testimony of Dr. Oni Fitzpatrick, a developmental psychologist who had done a social study of Kenisha’s background. He reported that she was shy and socially isolated growing up and was cooperative yet unmotivated at school. She was a good worker when she was employed with the Texas Department of Corrections but eventually had to leave that job because of absenteeism. Dr. Fitzpatrick thought that Kenisha appeared to be clinically depressed, a condition that could cloud her judgment and affect her decision-making process. Kenisha expressed love for her kids and denied killing Malachi. She told Fitzpatrick that when she first became pregnant, she worried that she would disappoint her mother and grandmother because she had failed to live up to their expectations. Fitzpatrick believed that there were mitigating circumstances in that Kenisha was under an extreme amount of pressure, and her socio-cultural background did not promote reaching out to others for assistance.
The defense also presented the testimony of psychiatrist Dr. Edward Gripon, who testified that Kenisha had been diagnosed with clinical depression in jail and had been placed on antidepressants. He suspected that she had been depressed for quite some time but had never sought treatment. He testified that clinical depression could impair Kenisha’s judgment and decision-making process. Kenisha denied killing Malachi but expressed remorse for what had happened. She told Gripon that she had abandoned Paris because she could not care for her and wanted to sever her relationship with Paris’s father. Gripon thought that there was a low risk of future danger because the incidents involving Malachi and Paris were so unique, and that there was only a remote possibility that Kenisha would become pregnant in prison. Given those circumstances, he saw little likelihood of Kenisha being a danger to society in the future.
Finally, the state called rebuttal witness Linda Emmons, the former Warden of a women’s prison who had been employed with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice for 23 years. She testified that female prisoners had become pregnant because of male prison guards and other male staff. She acknowledged that the only way prison staff would know that somebody is pregnant is either that somebody tells them or they’re able to see that the person is pregnant. Any activity of that sort between an inmate and a member of prison staff is defined as sexual assault, as inmates cannot legally give consent; this is a federal law. On cross-examination by the defense, Emmons testified that she had encountered over 3,000 female inmates in her years of employment at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. During that time, she had been personally aware of two inmates who had become pregnant and had heard about two or three others. She acknowledged that there was an extremely low likelihood that a female inmate would become pregnant while in prison, and that it was a possibility rather than a probability that such a situation would occur.
Kenisha Aranda Berry was convicted of capital homicide on February 19, 2004, and was initially sentenced to death. Please keep in mind this only pertains to the death of Malachi and not for abandoning Paris. She was later resentenced to life in prison on May 23, 2007, and will not be eligible for possible parole until 40 years of her sentence. Kenisha was finally held accountable for abandoning Paris on November 13, 2007. She is currently being held at the Christina Melton Crain Unit in Gatesville, Texas—the same unit that houses Crystal Villanueva, who you’ll remember from our previous episode on her case. After Kenisha’s conviction, custody of her four surviving kids was given to her great-aunt Joyce Johnson and her husband Edward Johnson of Beaumont, Texas.
As you’ll remember from last week’s episode, we covered Skylar Richardson, who was ultimately found innocent on very similar charges. As such, we’ve got a lot to unpack here. Skylar was a smart, pretty cheerleader from Ohio that grew up in a white, upper-middle-class background, who was put on trial for homicide after she buried her stillborn daughter in her family’s backyard after giving birth to her in a bathroom after prom. The jury found Skylar innocent on all charges except for abuse of a corpse. They felt that the state failed to meet their burden of proof, felt investigators were pushing a false narrative, and had rendered a false confession from a scared teenager. In October of 2022, her remaining charge was sealed. However, Skylar has been found guilty in the court of public opinion. Even today, we’ve heard from many folks who don’t believe that justice was served at all and feel that the verdict would have been very different had Skylar not been a pretty white girl. Furthermore, we had plenty of comments stating that they felt Skylar deserved the death penalty regardless of whether she had a stillbirth or not.
Kenisha grew up in Texas, a state that, alongside its neighbor of Oklahoma, accounts for 45 percent of the total executions in the United States. Texas is quick to send its mothers to both death and life in prison. We’ve seen this previously, even with women like Andrea Yates, who faced the death penalty and had to fight to be placed in a mental health facility. One stark difference is that Skylar attempted to fashion together a makeshift grave for her daughter, while Kenisha threw her son in the garbage. The other being that Skylar was a first-time offender, and Kenisha already had charges pending for abandoning her daughter, Paris. And to address the elephant in the room, the fact that Kenisha abandoned Paris is the biggest difference between Kenisha Berry and Skylar Richardson.
As we said earlier in this episode, evidence of other crimes is not admissible to prove the character of a person, but it may be admissible for proof of motive. That word, “motive,” is key. It would be understandable if someone theorized that if somebody was willing to throw a live baby in a ditch full of fire ants, that they might potentially be willing to put a live baby in a trash bag and then throw that bag in the dumpster. On the show, we’re all about fairness. We feel like people should be punished when they do something wrong, especially to our most vulnerable, but we need to be fair across the board or else laws are meaningless. In Kenisha’s case, the state did not meet their burden of proof as to whether Malachi died of natural causes or of homicide. As such, do you think that Kenisha should have been charged with capital homicide, or do you think that, like Skylar, she should have been charged with abuse of a corpse or discarding little Malachi’s body and then attempted homicide for leaving Paris to die? Let us know what you think in the comment section down below.
