Court docs: Fort Wayne woman tried to kill 11-week-old, put meds in breast milk
FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) — An arrest warrant has been issued for a Fort Wayne woman accused of plotting to kill her brother’s 11-week-old child with breast milk containing a potentially fatal amount of an over the counter pain medicine.
Sarai Rodriguez-Miranda was charged Monday in Allen County with one felony count of attempted murder and she’s believed to have fled to Michigan upon learning she was under investigation by police.
According to the affidavit for probable cause, the investigation began in January of this year after Rodriguez-Miranda’s grandmother read a text message conversation between her daughter and her daughter’s boyfriend on her cell phone. The affidavit indicated that Rodriguez-Miranda used her grandmother’s cell phone and that the grandmother monitored the usage. The two lived in the same home and the brother, his fiancee and the infant were staying at the home temporarily.
The text message conversation talked about using acetaminophen and sleeping pills to kill the child because the three were staying there longer.
One of the messages included a picture of a mortar and pestle with a white powder and another indicated the powder had been put in a baby bottle in the refrigerator.
The grandmother then went to the refrigerator and found two baby bottles; one of which had breast milk which was darker than in the other bottle and also appeared to contain a residue in the bottom.
Both bottles were put in a plastic grocery sack and then placed in a Ziploc bag by the grandmother. The grandmother then took the baby to a hospital emergency room so it could be checked for possible poisoning.
The baby showed no signs of poisoning and the mother told police she had not yet used either bottle to feed the child.
When an investigator returned to the home later in January to interview the grandmother, he was told by the grandmother that she had instructed Rodriguez-Miranda to be there, but she never showed up.
A forensic toxicologist found that the equivalent of nine Excedrin tablets were in the one baby bottle, more than enough to potentially cause death, and that the amount of milk in the bottle would be consistent with what an infant that age would consume at one time.
According to the affidavit, one of the text message from Rodriguez-Miranda read, “Yeah I thought it was funny that I don’t have an ounce of guilt.”