Utah mom who pleaded guilty to killing 6 newborns to serve at least 49 years
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A Utah woman convicted of killing six of her newborns and hiding their bodies in her garage will serve 49 years in prison before her first parole hearing.
Utah Board of Pardons and Parole spokesman Jim Hatch said Friday that 40-year-old Megan Huntsman has been scheduled to appear before the board in April 2064.
The Pleasant Grove woman told police she was too addicted to meth to care for more children during the decade she killed the babies. Huntsman was sentenced to up to life in prison in April. The parole board will decide her release date.
Authorities say Huntsman's estranged husband was the babies' father and found their stored bodies last April. A seventh baby found in the garage was stillborn.
The following text is from an earlier Q13 FOX News story:
The Los Angeles Times said that in April, Huntsman’s estranged husband found one body while cleaning the garage of the Pleasant Grove, Utah, home. Police soon found six others. Prosecutors said that one had been stillborn but that Megan Huntsman had killed the rest.
According to court documents, the babies’ bodies had been wrapped in towels or sweaters and packed with plastic wrap in storage boxes, some of which had been sealed shut with electrical tape. The boxes rested against a garage wall. Police have said they think she had the babies in a 10-year period, from 1996 to 2006.
Huntsman, 39, told police she had strangled or suffocated the infants and lost count of how many, court documents said.
According to the newspaper, Huntsman has three living daughters. Her husband, Darren West, had been away in federal prison on a methamphetamine-related conviction from 2006 to 2014; he found the first body not long after his release.