Woman Held in Death of Niece, Baby
SACRAMENTO — Police arrested a woman suspected of killing her 17-year-old niece and surgically removing the girl’s unborn baby after a dispute over who would have custody of the infant. The baby boy died a short time later.
Erin Rae Kuhn-Brown, 31, was arrested Monday. Police said she left the body of Kathaleena Louisa Draper near a road. Draper was close to giving birth, said Sacramento Police Sgt. Lance McHenry.
Police discovered Draper’s body Saturday, wrapped in plastic near a dump site in north Sacramento. They found the baby’s body Tuesday near Fallon, Nev.
Draper moved from Las Vegas three months ago to live with her aunt in Sacramento, and Kuhn-Brown planned to adopt the baby, police said.
They had an argument recently after the teenager decided to keep the baby, McHenry said.
Detectives believe that after the argument Thursday, en route back to Draper’s mother’s home in Las Vegas, Kuhn-Brown asphyxiated Draper and surgically removed the baby.
Kuhn-Brown, an emergency room technician at a south Sacramento hospital, sought to deliver the baby alive, but it died a short time later, McHenry said.
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