Dead Twin Newborns Tossed Down Trash Chute, Arrest Made 15 Years Later

[Dakota]

A Henrico County woman was arrested Tuesday and charged with killing her newborn twins more than 15 years ago in a dormitory at St. Paul’s College in Lawrenceville.

A Brunswick County grand jury indicted Darnesha Paulita Berry, 35, on two counts of first-degree murder, according to Assistant Chief B.N. Newcomb of the Lawrenceville Police Department.
[...]

Berry’s newborn twins, a boy and girl, were found dead in a trash room in the Holt Hall dorm at St. Paul’s College in February 1998, Newcomb said.

At the time, Berry was a student at the school and had lived in the dorm, Newcomb said.

Investigators believe the babies were born in a bathroom in the dorm, killed and thrown down a trash chute from a hallway inside the building, Newcomb said.

The state medical examiner’s office concluded that the cause of death for both babies was blunt-force trauma to the head, according to Lawrenceville Police Chief Everette Gibson.

Newcomb said Berry was not a suspect during the 1998 investigation.

But authorities received tips that led to Berry after CBS 6 ran a story about the cold case last year, Newcomb said.

“We found her to be the person of interest, and she was arrested,” Newcomb said.

Newcomb added that Berry is married and has a child. He said she has no criminal record as far as he knows.

http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/l...cle_0c37a62c-e2fb-5fe9-bee3-237faeeace73.html

Last month a grand jury indicted Berry on two counts of first-degree murder. She is now being held without bond.

Investigators said tips following a 2012 cold case story that aired on CBS 6, along with DNA evidence, led them to Berry.
[...]

The children, born alive in a dorm bathroom on Feb. 16, 1998, were killed and then thrown down the trash chute, police said. Berry would have been age 19 at the time.

http://wtvr.com/2013/07/02/st-paul-college-twins-death-arrest/


The CBS 6 2012 investigation that started the tips rolling in:

A small Virginia town was shaken, fourteen years ago to the day — Feb. 16 — when residents learned two babies had been murdered on a local college campus.

CBS 6 News Senior Reporter Wayne Covil covered the story in Warrantsville and could never shake it. Just like the police investigators who are haunted by the crime to this very day.

Two babies, twins, not even a day old, were birthed and then dumped down a trash chute. The twins were never given a name, and the case was never solved.

After Covil began looking into this cold case, several in town, including Williams Funeral Home, realized the twins’ grave at St. Paul’s Cemetery had remained un-marked all these years.

Just this week that changed.

The Newsome Monument Company donated and installed a granite headstone for the baby boy and baby girl.

People who were involved with the case showed up for the memorial and said it will help keep the twins from being forgotten.

Video at link gives full story: http://wtvr.com/2012/02/16/investigation-twins-cold-case-murder-haunts-investigators-3/

 

[BostonBurns]

They are just trying her now
http://www.inquisitr.com/1946204/da...umping-babies-in-college-trash-chute-in-1998/

The trial of Darnesha Berry, the mother accused of killing her newborn infants and throwing them down a college garbage chute almost two decades ago, begins on Monday. The Richmond Times Dispatch is reporting today that Darnesha Paulita Berry will stand trial for first-degree murder in the deaths of both babies.


Darnesha Berry, 37, was originally arrested in July 2013 after police reignited the cold case investigation into their deaths. Follow-up news coverage of the cold case produced several leads for police. Those leads led to Darnesha Berry, who was a student at the time, according to the Daily Mail.

The babies were found in February of 1998 at about 6:30 a.m by a housekeeper at Saint Paul’s College in Lawrenceville, Virginia. When police arrived at the location, they found two newborn babies — a boy and a girl — on the basement floor of the college. An investigation indicated that the babies had been discarded in the trash chute on the upper floors where the dorm bathrooms were located.


Read more at http://www.inquisitr.com/1946204/da...lege-trash-chute-in-1998/#COfjYmXB1Rbyexxh.99

 

[gatekeeper]

While the case was cold, Darnesha Berry started her life anew. She got married, had several children, and worked a job at a local bank.

Ya know, intellectually, I think most of us get it. I do. And it's something we have to accept b/c it's reality. Shit happens and the world is a vampire and all the psych reasons and blah, blah, blah. Period. But aside from that, I swear on my own life I will never, ever understand this shit on a human, gutteral/emotional level. Never.

 

[JackBurton]

This woman has a hideous name.

Not surprising some skank college bimbo did something like this though.

 

[DeeDee]

The more recent post of twins in the trash had this story suggested at the bottom. Figured I would add an update. She was sentenced to 8 years. 4 lousy years per baby. Convicted of involuntary manslaughter which is fuckin ridiculous. Nobody made her throw them down the chute and she damn well knew if the fall didnt kill them then being crushed on the garbage truck would. She basically got away with murder.

Mom who killed her newborn twins sentenced to 8 years in prison

Darnesha Berry threw her babies down the trash chute of her fourth-floor dorm at St. Paul’s College in Lawrence, Virginia, back in 1998.

www.wtvr.com

 

[mightymorphinepowerbottom]

The more recent post of twins in the trash had this story suggested at the bottom. Figured I would add an update. She was sentenced to 8 years. 4 lousy years per baby. Convicted of involuntary manslaughter which is fuckin ridiculous. Nobody made her throw them down the chute and she damn well knew if the fall didnt kill them then being crushed on the garbage truck would. She basically got away with murder.

Mom who killed her newborn twins sentenced to 8 years in prison

Darnesha Berry threw her babies down the trash chute of her fourth-floor dorm at St. Paul’s College in Lawrence, Virginia, back in 1998.

www.wtvr.com

Thanks, I was coming here from that article. I'm stunned how selfish she was to get pregnant again. You'd think she would try to prevent that again? Unless the timing of the twins was inconvenient to her and now she has the time in which the judge should clearly see that act of killing the first 2 children was done out of selfishness.

 

[DeeDee]

Id guess she didn't want to give up school or the twins dad didn't want her so she knew she would be on her own and didn't want that. I mean no reason is anything other than selfish really.

She's a cold bitch that went on to have 4 more children and create a life for herself. A life her babies never got a chance to have.

 

[Lucky Charms]

Does anyone know if she's already released. Sickening!!

 

[DeeDee]

If she isn't she will be this year since its been 8 years since sentencing. I couldn't find any articles saying she had been released.