Mom called 911 hours after her baby died, Georgia cops say. She’s charged with murder

A woman is charged with murder and child cruelty after Georgia police say she didn’t call for help until hours after her infant died.

Doneish’a Speight, of Atlanta, was booked into Fulton County Jail on Oct. 6 in connection with her daughter’s death, according to jail records.

Speight was arrested about a week after the woman’s Oct. 1 call, according to documents McClatchy News obtained from the Atlanta Police Department.

McClatchy News could not immediately reach the public defender listed as Speight’s lawyer on Oct. 10.

Speight told police she called 911 when she found her 6-month old child, Angel, wasn’t breathing normally, according to arrest affidavits obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

But when the child was taken to the hospital, staff said they couldn’t take the girl’s temperature, which indicates she had been dead for an “extended period of time,” the Journal-Constitution reported.

Officials also found bruising around the girl’s neck, which the mother said was from the girl touching her own neck, WSB-TV reported.

An autopsy from the Fulton County Medical Examiner found the girl had bruises around her head and neck and swelling in her brain, according to the news station. Officers say the injuries are consistent with blunt force trauma.

The mother initially denied fault but later said she accidentally hit her child’s head on the crib when she was cleaning the room and arguing with a man on the phone, WXIA reported.

The warrants say Speight’s story was “inconsistent with the findings” of the medical examiner, according to the outlet.

This story was originally published October 10, 2023 at 4:27 PM with the headline "Mom called 911 hours after her baby died, Georgia cops say. She’s charged with murder."