(NewsSpace.com) – On October 10, 2005, an infant girl, dubbed “Baby Skylar,” was found stuffed into a plastic bag in the garbage can of a women’s bathroom in Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. That led to an immediate investigation and search for the baby’s mom. Sadly, the case went cold, and authorities were unable to solve it. Still, it remained a controversial case that never quite left the public eye. Now, almost 20 years later, police have not only identified but also arrested a suspect in the case.
When the baby was found, a medical examiner did an autopsy on her and determined the cause of death was suffocation and deemed it a homicide. It also came out that baby Skylar was not born in the airport but rather abandoned there. Police had tried to follow many leads, including seeking information from local Marriott hotels as the baby was wrapped in a plastic bag bearing the chain’s logo. Those leads dried up, however.
Through genetic genealogy, a relatively new practice using DNA to identify potential family members in a wide-reaching database, investigators discovered a potential match. That person allowed law enforcement to collect a single sample for a one-time use, which led to further discovery.
From there, they traveled to Washington State, where they met with and questioned Anderson in 2022. The woman admitted that she was the dead infant’s mother and gave them a rundown of the events leading up to the child’s death, which they have yet to make public.
It took a bit of time, but a Maricopa County grand jury issued an arrest warrant with a first-degree murder charge for Anderson. Police in Washington arrested her on Tuesday, February 20, and placed her in custody. She is now waiting for extradition to Arizona, where she is expected to be charged with multiple felonies. There is no statute of limitations on murder in the US.
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