Esperanza Rae Harding, left, told police she drowned her baby, Mateo Harding, in a bathtub, according to documents. Edwin Cosmo Trudeau, right, told her to throw the body away, and he did not seek help, authorities said. (Mug shots: Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office)
A woman allegedly told Minnesota cops that she drowned her baby because his crying ruined her bath, and instead of calling for help, she and her boyfriend had sex in the next room while the victim lay dead on the bathroom floor.
The mother, Esperanza Rae Harding, 20, is locked up in a Hennepin County jail on a $1.5 million bond for murder in the second degree. Meanwhile, her boyfriend, Edwin Cosmo Trudeau, 18, is behind bars for aiding an offender – accomplice after the fact. He allegedly told her to throw the body in a dumpster.
The victim is 7-month-old Mateo Harding, according to The Star Tribune.
According to the court documents, Minneapolis police were dispatched on Wednesday to Children’s Hospital regarding a missing child call.
Harding allegedly claimed her baby died of natural causes in the hospital on March 1, but neither the hospital nor the medical examiner’s office had any record of this.
Suspicious, cops sat down with Harding, who kept giving them inconsistent information, documents stated.
Eventually, she admitted the baby did not die at the hospital, but at a hotel in Bloomington on Feb. 28, according to authorities.
“The defendant admitted that Victim drowned in the bathtub and that she wrapped up his body, put it in a backpack, and threw it in a dumpster,” they wrote.
Minneapolis cops brought in their Bloomington counterparts.
“The defendant stated that she had been dating a man named Edwin Trudeau who did not like her child and that he wanted her to give Victim up for adoption,” documents wrote. “She stated that Trudeau wanted her to prove that he was her top priority.”
On Feb. 28, she was taking a bath while the baby was in the other room and began crying.
From documents:
The defendant admitted that she was upset that she could not enjoy her bath. According to the defendant, she then put Victim in the full bathtub and drowned him. The defendant took a photo of Victim floating face down in the full tub. The photo was recovered from her phone. She said she picked Victim up out of the water after he was “done moving, done twitching.”
She allegedly admitted texting Trudeau during this time.
“She sent subsequent texts referring to herself as a monster for what she had done and asking Trudeau how to get away with it,” authorities wrote.
“Ok that’s ok,” Trudeau allegedly wrote back.
When Harding texted that the baby was dead and she was sorry, the boyfriend wrote back, “Don’t be,” documents said.
In court documents of Trudeau’s case, Harding wrote that the baby was dead and she was attempting CPR. Trudeau allegedly told her to stop, “its ok ima help” and later “your making things harder stop we are a team we do this.”
He arrived at the hotel and unsuccessfully performed CPR before she and he had sex in the other room while the baby was dead on the bathroom floor, Harding allegedly said.
Trudeau did not call 911 or seek help for the baby, documents stated.
He told her to bring the baby to the dumpster and to make it seem like she was throwing trash out, documents said.
Trudeau allegedly told her, in the paraphrasing of the affidavit, “keep her mouth shut.”
“If you go down, I go down no matter what,” he allegedly said.
“It is always going to be us, Bonnie and Clyde,” he allegedly said.
Harding allegedly said she put the body in a backpack and threw the infant’s body into a dumpster in the hotel parking lot.
“The defendant stated that she knew she was going to do time because she killed her own kid,” they wrote.
Trudeau allegedly admitted finding the baby dead in the hotel room bathroom, and that instead of calling for help, he had sex with Harding before leaving the hotel room.
Authorities have yet to find the body, documents stated.
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