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#Post#: 7916--------------------------------------------------
Re: GOODHUE COUNTY INFANT DOE (2003): WM, newborn, found at Lake
Pepin, MN - 7 December 2003
By: Akoya Date: July 12, 2020, 6:03 pm
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Frontenac State Park
HTML https://i.imgur.com/od01sOZ.jpg
Red Wing, Minnesota. The Rush River delta into Lake Pepin
HTML https://i.imgur.com/YUeWOr9.jpg
#Post#: 7917--------------------------------------------------
Re: GOODHUE COUNTY INFANT DOE (2003): WM, newborn, found at Lake
Pepin, MN - 7 December 2003
By: Akoya Date: July 12, 2020, 6:04 pm
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HTML https://i.imgur.com/T2evXxU.gif
HTML https://i.imgur.com/pYn0Aq5.gif
#Post#: 7918--------------------------------------------------
Re: GOODHUE COUNTY INFANT DOE (2003): WM, newborn, found at Lake
Pepin, MN - 7 December 2003
By: Akoya Date: July 12, 2020, 6:06 pm
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HTML https://i.imgur.com/XOAVXrZ.png
#Post#: 7919--------------------------------------------------
Re: GOODHUE COUNTY INFANT DOE (2003): WM, newborn, found at Lake
Pepin, MN - 7 December 2003
By: Akoya Date: July 12, 2020, 6:08 pm
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Panoramic view of Lake Pepin from Florence Township's public
beach in Frontenac.
HTML https://i.imgur.com/Pua4wtx.jpg
#Post#: 7920--------------------------------------------------
Re: GOODHUE COUNTY INFANT DOE (2003): WM, newborn, found at Lake
Pepin, MN - 7 December 2003
By: Akoya Date: July 12, 2020, 6:09 pm
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HTML https://i.imgur.com/2cmTgJN.gif
#Post#: 10111--------------------------------------------------
Re: GOODHUE COUNTY INFANT DOE (2003): WM, newborn, found at Lake
Pepin, MN - 7 December 2003
By: Scorpio Date: December 11, 2022, 9:07 pm
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HTML https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/mother-charged-in-death-of-baby-found-in-river-in-2003/
Jennifer Matter Charged In Death Of Baby Found In Lake Pepin In
2003
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- Investigators say they have arrested a
mother and are charging her in the death of baby, found in Lake
Pepin almost 20 years ago, and the charging documents allege she
was also mother to another baby found in the Mississippi River
in 1999.
Jennifer Matter, 50, of Red Wing, was taken into custody Monday
morning. She faces second-degree murder charges in the case of a
baby boy discovered at the Methodist Campus Beach in Frontenac
in December 2003.
Investigators say that another baby, a girl found in the
Mississippi River's Lower Boat Harbor near Red Wing back in
1999, is also Matter's, as proven by genealogy work. The charges
announced Monday do not involve that case, and further charges
may follow.
Both cases went unsolved for decades.
"It has been 8,222 days since we discovered our first newborn
wrapped in a towel and floating in the water near the city of
Red Wing," Goodhue County Sheriff Marty Kelly said. "Almost four
years later another newborn baby was discovered on the shore of
Lake Pepin in Frotenac."
Last year, the Minnesota BCA Crime Lab was able to determine and
identify the biological father of the infant found in 1999, and
worked to establish that Matter was a person of interest.
Investigators interviewed her in late April, and she denied
knowing anything about either case. When they sampled her DNA
sample on a search warrant last week, she again denied knowing
about either baby.
On a third interview with investigators, Matter told them that
back in 1999, she was "in and out of jail, drinking too much,
doing a lot of stupid things," and that she didn't know she was
pregnant until she started bleeding while on the way to drop off
two other kids at school and daycare.
She said she then gave birth at home in her bathroom and
"freaked out" when she saw the baby was born "blue, was not
breathing, and was not crying." She said she knew she should've
sought help but that "her mind was not there." She wrapped the
baby and, possibly a day later, left the baby's body at Bay
Point Park in the middle of the night.
She told investigators she didn't remember a second baby, but
later said "it was in Frontenac," and said she was "almost
positive" she was at a public beach alone when she went into
labor. She was "trying to lay low because she had an arrest
warrant and believed cops were looking for her." She said she
didn't remember if the baby was crying, but said it was
breathing fine.
She said she left the baby on the beach before driving away, and
said she did not have a plan about leaving the baby in a safe
place, but "hoped that someone in the nearby houses would find
the baby."
She said during the 2003 pregnancy, she never intended to keep
the baby and considered giving it up for adoption but otherwise
had no plans, and did not receive neonatal care or tell anyone
she was pregnant.
"I want to recognize the persistence, hard work, and dedication
of our law enforcement professionals who have put so much of
themselves into solving this case," Goodhue County Attorney
Stephen O'Keefe said.
Sheriff Kelly said that the case was helped by the entire
community, who donated $10,000 to assist the department and help
them conduct the DNA comparisons, and specifically thanked one
by name.
"There is one person, however, who has lived this case with our
law enforcement partners alongside of us for 22 years -- Jeanne
Madtson," Kelly said. "She's cared for these children, hed their
funerals, paid for their burials, and most importantly, she
never forgot."
In 2011, Mattson and her husband Don donated their family plot
in Red Wing's Oakwood Cemetery to the babies involved in
Matter's case, along with two others that police don't believe
are connected.
David Vonce is one of many people who live in Red Wing haunted
by the murder of the two infants.
"Those babies had their whole lives ahead of them. I don't know
what she was thinking; anybody would have adopted them," Vonce
said. "We as Red Wing-ites can't believe this happened because
we really cherish our children. They're gifts from God."
If convicted, Matter faces 40 years in prison.
"Genetic genealogy and Rapid DNA testing were both employed to
develop a break in the case and then quickly confirm the
identity of the babies' mother," Bureau of Criminal Apprehension
Superintendent Drew Evans said. "These kinds of scientific
advances that can aid investigations are happening all the time.
That is why it is so important to never give up on any unsolved
case."
#Post#: 10112--------------------------------------------------
Re: GOODHUE COUNTY INFANT DOE (2003): WM, newborn, found at Lake
Pepin, MN - 7 December 2003
By: Scorpio Date: December 11, 2022, 9:08 pm
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Photograph of Jennifer Lynn Matter
HTML https://i.imgur.com/Q84GHWpl.jpg
Jennifer Matter, 50, of Red Wing, Minn., was charged with
second-degree murder in the 2003 death of a newborn boy whose
body was found in Frontenac on the shore of the Mississippi
River. According to court documents, Matter also told
investigators she abandoned another newborn in 1999 in the
Mississippi near Red Wing. A third infant found in the river was
not related to the other two babies, according to DNA analysis.
HTML https://www.twincities.com/2022/05/09/red-wing-woman-charged-two-decades-after-newborns-found-dead-in-mississippi-river/
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