March 11, 2026
Former University of Kentucky Cheerleader Charged With 1st Degree Manslaughter
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RSS Feed A grand jury has indicted 22-year-old Laken Snelling with the much more serious charge of first degree manslaughter for the death of her newborn baby last August. Police initially charged the college senior with lesser counts of abuse of a corpse and tampering with physical evidence after finding the body of her newborn hidden in a black trash bag in Snelling’s closet. The medical examiner determined the baby was born alive, but died by “asphyxia by undetermined means.”
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00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey, folks, it is Wednesday, March eleventh, and a grand jury thinks a college cheerleader should face manslaughter chargers in the death of her newborn. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ. Robes. I don't think I have seen a headline that didn't include the fact that she was a cheerleader. Right or wrong, she was, and that's just the fact of the case that is getting a lot of attention.
00:00:29
Speaker 2: Yes, we're we're talking about at the time, she was twenty one years old, Laken Snelling, a senior at the University of Kentucky. And yes, her cheerleading picture is everywhere because she looks like this all American girl at the University of Kentucky. How could she be capable of doing what prosecutors claim she did.
00:00:51
Speaker 1: You know what, if you having been following this story at all, just right now, close your eyes and picture a University of Kentucky cheerleader, she probably comes to mind. Yes, right, she just fits that bill. She looks like that. So I guess Robes, that was a part a lot of the intrigue. But she is a senior, she was twenty one years old. I guess a lot of The details of this, of this this crime now are certainly horrific. But the update we just got ropes she was initially arrested, but she's been out and we just got an update this week. They presented evidence to a grandeury.
00:01:28
Speaker 2: Yep, they gave the grand jury all of the evidence from the autopsy, the medical examiner, interviews with her roommates, and even interviews with her. Because initially she was charged with abusive a corpse, tampering with physical evidence, and concealing the birth of an infant. I didn't even know that was a crime, concealing the birth of an infant's I was.
00:01:50
Speaker 1: Going to ask you about that earlier.
00:01:51
Speaker 2: That seems so sad to me. I'm imagining. Look, I am not excusing anything that she is being charged with, and certainly believed that if you take a life for whatever reason, you need to be able to have your day in court and explain yourself and face charges. But concealing the birth of an infant, I see a scared young girl who didn't know what to do and panicked, and I just my heart breaks because this is just an awful situation all around. You think about this young girl who was living one life as a cheerleader, a college student and was probably just unwilling to accept the reality for a situation and then panicked. So I didn't know you could be charged because you didn't let anyone know you gave birth. I didn't realize that was a crime.
00:02:44
Speaker 1: You know what did two things on this one is I didn't realize it needed to be a crime. Yeah, quite frankly, and road, I think from a practical standpoint, yes, as a society we what we document when people come into this world, and we document when they leave. That's true, and this is part of it. We can't just have some new human running around there that we don't know about. So yes, I did. I was actually I meant to ask you about that earlier because I had not heard of it.
00:03:14
Speaker 2: It's the first time I've ever seen that actually written down, and as I was reading it out loud, I thought, wow, this is a crime. But yes, as you point out, that does make sense. Once you are you give birth to another human being, that human being has to be acknowledged. It the birth needs to be recorded. It's your responsibility as a mom, as a parent, to document that you have just brought a human into the world. I guess it makes sense, just never imagined that. So, yes, those were the initial charges. She was arrested, she had a hearing, they again gave this case to a grand jury. While she was put on house arrest, she was given a monitor. She has a monitor on her and was staying with her father, I believe. But now a grand jury has indicted her on first degree manslaughter charges, and so a new warrant for her arrest has been issued and she is now going to have to go through another sentencing or not excuse me, another hearing next month to face this new, much more serious charge.
00:04:18
Speaker 1: And this all stems from story last year. We did get into it and talk about it here on the podcast, But this was last year, last summer that authorities were first alerted and got a call about an unresponsive infant. Now, this young lady at this apartment, Robes, they did not live on campus. We need to make that clear. So the apartment was not on campus, but they got there and found, yes, an unresponsive infant, and I guess Robes the Yeah, it was clear that the baby wasn't just placed there people somebody went through some effort to conceal.
00:04:57
Speaker 2: Maybe, yes, and Laken snelling has a fit, talked to police, but this all came to their They became aware of the situation because her own roommates called nine one one. They they said they heard noises, strange noises coming from her room. Then she left and they found this baby wrapped in a towel and then placed in a black trash bag, and they lake and apparently had said she wasn't feeling well, that she was going to go to the school Health center clinic. She did go to class and then she stopped by a McDonald's. I believe that's where they found her, and she was outside of the health clinic, but she never actually went in. And she basically pretty quickly admitted to police that she gave birth to the baby and that she thought the baby was alive, but that she fell asleep on top of the baby. That is what her official statement is as to what happened to the child. That she was exhausted, she fell asleep on top of him. When she woke up, he was blue. This is what she's told police.
00:06:02
Speaker 1: I mean, she gets to have her say in her day in court. I mean, yeah, I reserve until you hear from this young lady who's right now. Her life has just changed. Yes, And so up to a jury, is someone going to hear gonna be sympathetic, They're gonna hear, as you say, a young lady who was scared, she panicked and she did this thing. Or are they going to hear something else about this young lady and how she behaved that led up to this. We don't know. And also where's the dad in this.
00:06:37
Speaker 2: We that's never once been talked about. I've never seen one article that it at least even acknowledges that if someone even knew they were the father. That hasn't even been talked about in any article I've seen. But certainly I imagine as this does eventually make its way into court, all of those questions will be asked. The grand jury was actually given options, I believe, of four levels of homicide and they decided that manslaughter in the first degree was the charge that should come out. But they could have charged her with an array of different types of homicide charges. But based on the information they were given, and they went through the whole process. A grand jury, of course, is done in secret, but this is an opportunity for the prosecution to put forth all of their evidence. In grand jury investigations, the defense does not actually even have a say. They're just trying to figure out if there is enough evidence to pursue further charges, and this grand jury thought there were. So this young lady I believe she is now twenty two years old, is now going to have to face first degree manslaughter charges in addition to the other charges that were already brought against her back in August when the baby was first found.
00:07:46
Speaker 1: Don't I don't know. I haven't checked to see what the I guess what the prison.
00:07:52
Speaker 2: Time is first degree manslaughter. I have to look that up. This is just a tough, tough situation. Something else that came out that I thought was interesting. Police have said that obviously, when they go to investigate these sorts of things, they look at all the evidence they could possibly get, and a lot of evidence these days is on our phone, correct. I mean that's where I feel like so many crimes are solved or at least litigated because of evidence that's on your phone. And that is the case as well, because they say she deleted labor photos and evidence of the pregnancy from her phone. She deleted them, so she was trying to basically make it seem as though she was never pregnant and a baby was never born. And that is a part of the evidence that the grand jury was looking at when they came up with this determination to go forward with this more serious charge.
00:08:45
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, that lends to a different theory about someone who is just panicked. That's a different theory. It sounds like someone who obviously she knew she was pregnant, maybe she didn't know until late. Even if you give her that, I mean, Brobes, this suggests someone is trying to get away and certainly hide.
00:09:06
Speaker 2: Yes, crime, Yes, and that is what police believe in. That is what a grand jury has decided as well. And look, I always just find these sorts of cases, especially we don't know when she knew she was pregnant, how long she knew she was pregnant. There are so many questions in this. She was a cheerleader, she was active, she was a student athlete. So to be able to hide a pregnancy like this all the way up until the moment you give birth is something that I always have a hard time imagining. Haven't been pregnant twice in my life. The idea of being able to hide it the idea of not knowing, and we see cases like this all the time of women literally not knowing they're pregnant, having pain and thinking what's going on, and suddenly a baby's there. We don't know at what point she realized she was pregnant. We don't have any of that information.
00:09:55
Speaker 1: But stay here. We'll explain what she told according to police documents, about the death of her child and why she laid next to him.
00:10:08
Speaker 2: Stam, Welcome back, everyone to this episode of Amy and DJ. We're updating a story we first told you about last summer. In August, upcoming incoming college senior at the University of Kentucky, a cheerleader, a stunt squad member, Lake and Snelling had been found with a newborn child in her closet, hidden wrapped. The child had died, but upon further investigation, the autopsy showed that the child was born alive. Police had initially charged Lake and Snelling with some lesser degrees lesser charges, but a grand jury this week has handed down a much more serious indictment against Snelling. They are charging her now with first degree manslaughter in the death of her newborn. Her roommates were the folks who first alerted police. They called nine one one, and the investigation has been going on now for months, and now this young woman is going to be facing a much more serious charge. You asked before the break just what the punishment is if you're found guilty of first degree manslaughter, and it's actually much more serious than I imagine. It's considered a Class A felony. Basically, you are being charged for recklessly causing the death of another person and you can face a sentence of up to life in prison.
00:11:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, don't don't. I don't know, man, I don't know what do you do here? The child was born alive and the one person who had a decision to make about that child's life failed it. I don't know what the reasons were. I will be open minded to hear, but my goodness.
00:12:07
Speaker 2: It's devastating. And this is a tough, tough, tough case. The medical examiner in Kentucky they're determined, yes, that the baby was in fact born alive and the cause of death was listed as asphyxia by undetermined means. And I think this will be a big deal when and if this does go to court. Who knows she could make a plea deal with prosecutors that would possibly be a way forward in this case. But if it does go to trials, certainly that undetermined means will be in question because from what we hear from Lake and Snelling, by all accounts, she didn't intend to kill her baby. She says she fell asleep on top of him, that she was awake for about thirty minutes. She did say she heard the baby he she said he, So it was a little boy, make some whimpers. So she did acknowledge that the baby was born alive. That's of note. The medical examiner also agreed with that. So she never has tried to say that the baby was still born and she didn't know what to do. She has admitted that the baby was born alive. It's what happened next that is going.
00:13:13
Speaker 1: To fight about. In course, yes, she says she accidentally killed her child. Okay, jury determines that's the case, then it's a matter of her mistreating a corpse. But Vavee, that is that we are that is the case. Did she kill this baby or not?
00:13:34
Speaker 2: And the problem is the only person who knows is Lake and Snelling. No one else was in the room. Her roommates. By all accounts. No one even knew she was pregnant. No one has come forward saying they knew she was pregnant, that she talked about her pregnancy, that she talked about being nervous about not knowing what to do. This came as a surprise to the girls who lived with her. And look, you live with a bunch of girls off campus, been there, done that. It's hard to imagine that no one knew she was nine months pregnant. That's a remarkable thing to me to even get my head around. And then to only have reported hearing noises. Obviously, they thought something strange was going on, and they went into her room, and they investigated, and they found the baby wrapped up like a burrito. As how the baby was described in a trash bag in her closet. Now, she did say that she laid next to this baby to comfort the baby. Correct, that was what she told police, That this was giving her comfort and that the death was purely accidental. So look, we will have to wait and see what happens next. Again, she has a court hearing next month in April. Perhaps she'll say something, perhaps she won't. But her next arrayment is on April tenth. We will continue to follow this story, but it certainly is a sad one, and we certainly you know, it's hard to say if this was an accident, if this was a panicked moment, certainly the cover up after the fact. She's admitted to panicking and not knowing what to do. But this is just a heartbreaking story all around, and we just appreciate you listening to us update you on this latest information coming out of Kentucky. I'm Amy Roebuck alongside my partner T. J. Holmes. We will talk to you soon.
Speaker 1: Hey, folks, it is Wednesday, March eleventh, and a grand jury thinks a college cheerleader should face manslaughter chargers in the death of her newborn. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ. Robes. I don't think I have seen a headline that didn't include the fact that she was a cheerleader. Right or wrong, she was, and that's just the fact of the case that is getting a lot of attention.
00:00:29
Speaker 2: Yes, we're we're talking about at the time, she was twenty one years old, Laken Snelling, a senior at the University of Kentucky. And yes, her cheerleading picture is everywhere because she looks like this all American girl at the University of Kentucky. How could she be capable of doing what prosecutors claim she did.
00:00:51
Speaker 1: You know what, if you having been following this story at all, just right now, close your eyes and picture a University of Kentucky cheerleader, she probably comes to mind. Yes, right, she just fits that bill. She looks like that. So I guess Robes, that was a part a lot of the intrigue. But she is a senior, she was twenty one years old. I guess a lot of The details of this, of this this crime now are certainly horrific. But the update we just got ropes she was initially arrested, but she's been out and we just got an update this week. They presented evidence to a grandeury.
00:01:28
Speaker 2: Yep, they gave the grand jury all of the evidence from the autopsy, the medical examiner, interviews with her roommates, and even interviews with her. Because initially she was charged with abusive a corpse, tampering with physical evidence, and concealing the birth of an infant. I didn't even know that was a crime, concealing the birth of an infant's I was.
00:01:50
Speaker 1: Going to ask you about that earlier.
00:01:51
Speaker 2: That seems so sad to me. I'm imagining. Look, I am not excusing anything that she is being charged with, and certainly believed that if you take a life for whatever reason, you need to be able to have your day in court and explain yourself and face charges. But concealing the birth of an infant, I see a scared young girl who didn't know what to do and panicked, and I just my heart breaks because this is just an awful situation all around. You think about this young girl who was living one life as a cheerleader, a college student and was probably just unwilling to accept the reality for a situation and then panicked. So I didn't know you could be charged because you didn't let anyone know you gave birth. I didn't realize that was a crime.
00:02:44
Speaker 1: You know what did two things on this one is I didn't realize it needed to be a crime. Yeah, quite frankly, and road, I think from a practical standpoint, yes, as a society we what we document when people come into this world, and we document when they leave. That's true, and this is part of it. We can't just have some new human running around there that we don't know about. So yes, I did. I was actually I meant to ask you about that earlier because I had not heard of it.
00:03:14
Speaker 2: It's the first time I've ever seen that actually written down, and as I was reading it out loud, I thought, wow, this is a crime. But yes, as you point out, that does make sense. Once you are you give birth to another human being, that human being has to be acknowledged. It the birth needs to be recorded. It's your responsibility as a mom, as a parent, to document that you have just brought a human into the world. I guess it makes sense, just never imagined that. So, yes, those were the initial charges. She was arrested, she had a hearing, they again gave this case to a grand jury. While she was put on house arrest, she was given a monitor. She has a monitor on her and was staying with her father, I believe. But now a grand jury has indicted her on first degree manslaughter charges, and so a new warrant for her arrest has been issued and she is now going to have to go through another sentencing or not excuse me, another hearing next month to face this new, much more serious charge.
00:04:18
Speaker 1: And this all stems from story last year. We did get into it and talk about it here on the podcast, But this was last year, last summer that authorities were first alerted and got a call about an unresponsive infant. Now, this young lady at this apartment, Robes, they did not live on campus. We need to make that clear. So the apartment was not on campus, but they got there and found, yes, an unresponsive infant, and I guess Robes the Yeah, it was clear that the baby wasn't just placed there people somebody went through some effort to conceal.
00:04:57
Speaker 2: Maybe, yes, and Laken snelling has a fit, talked to police, but this all came to their They became aware of the situation because her own roommates called nine one one. They they said they heard noises, strange noises coming from her room. Then she left and they found this baby wrapped in a towel and then placed in a black trash bag, and they lake and apparently had said she wasn't feeling well, that she was going to go to the school Health center clinic. She did go to class and then she stopped by a McDonald's. I believe that's where they found her, and she was outside of the health clinic, but she never actually went in. And she basically pretty quickly admitted to police that she gave birth to the baby and that she thought the baby was alive, but that she fell asleep on top of the baby. That is what her official statement is as to what happened to the child. That she was exhausted, she fell asleep on top of him. When she woke up, he was blue. This is what she's told police.
00:06:02
Speaker 1: I mean, she gets to have her say in her day in court. I mean, yeah, I reserve until you hear from this young lady who's right now. Her life has just changed. Yes, And so up to a jury, is someone going to hear gonna be sympathetic, They're gonna hear, as you say, a young lady who was scared, she panicked and she did this thing. Or are they going to hear something else about this young lady and how she behaved that led up to this. We don't know. And also where's the dad in this.
00:06:37
Speaker 2: We that's never once been talked about. I've never seen one article that it at least even acknowledges that if someone even knew they were the father. That hasn't even been talked about in any article I've seen. But certainly I imagine as this does eventually make its way into court, all of those questions will be asked. The grand jury was actually given options, I believe, of four levels of homicide and they decided that manslaughter in the first degree was the charge that should come out. But they could have charged her with an array of different types of homicide charges. But based on the information they were given, and they went through the whole process. A grand jury, of course, is done in secret, but this is an opportunity for the prosecution to put forth all of their evidence. In grand jury investigations, the defense does not actually even have a say. They're just trying to figure out if there is enough evidence to pursue further charges, and this grand jury thought there were. So this young lady I believe she is now twenty two years old, is now going to have to face first degree manslaughter charges in addition to the other charges that were already brought against her back in August when the baby was first found.
00:07:46
Speaker 1: Don't I don't know. I haven't checked to see what the I guess what the prison.
00:07:52
Speaker 2: Time is first degree manslaughter. I have to look that up. This is just a tough, tough situation. Something else that came out that I thought was interesting. Police have said that obviously, when they go to investigate these sorts of things, they look at all the evidence they could possibly get, and a lot of evidence these days is on our phone, correct. I mean that's where I feel like so many crimes are solved or at least litigated because of evidence that's on your phone. And that is the case as well, because they say she deleted labor photos and evidence of the pregnancy from her phone. She deleted them, so she was trying to basically make it seem as though she was never pregnant and a baby was never born. And that is a part of the evidence that the grand jury was looking at when they came up with this determination to go forward with this more serious charge.
00:08:45
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, that lends to a different theory about someone who is just panicked. That's a different theory. It sounds like someone who obviously she knew she was pregnant, maybe she didn't know until late. Even if you give her that, I mean, Brobes, this suggests someone is trying to get away and certainly hide.
00:09:06
Speaker 2: Yes, crime, Yes, and that is what police believe in. That is what a grand jury has decided as well. And look, I always just find these sorts of cases, especially we don't know when she knew she was pregnant, how long she knew she was pregnant. There are so many questions in this. She was a cheerleader, she was active, she was a student athlete. So to be able to hide a pregnancy like this all the way up until the moment you give birth is something that I always have a hard time imagining. Haven't been pregnant twice in my life. The idea of being able to hide it the idea of not knowing, and we see cases like this all the time of women literally not knowing they're pregnant, having pain and thinking what's going on, and suddenly a baby's there. We don't know at what point she realized she was pregnant. We don't have any of that information.
00:09:55
Speaker 1: But stay here. We'll explain what she told according to police documents, about the death of her child and why she laid next to him.
00:10:08
Speaker 2: Stam, Welcome back, everyone to this episode of Amy and DJ. We're updating a story we first told you about last summer. In August, upcoming incoming college senior at the University of Kentucky, a cheerleader, a stunt squad member, Lake and Snelling had been found with a newborn child in her closet, hidden wrapped. The child had died, but upon further investigation, the autopsy showed that the child was born alive. Police had initially charged Lake and Snelling with some lesser degrees lesser charges, but a grand jury this week has handed down a much more serious indictment against Snelling. They are charging her now with first degree manslaughter in the death of her newborn. Her roommates were the folks who first alerted police. They called nine one one, and the investigation has been going on now for months, and now this young woman is going to be facing a much more serious charge. You asked before the break just what the punishment is if you're found guilty of first degree manslaughter, and it's actually much more serious than I imagine. It's considered a Class A felony. Basically, you are being charged for recklessly causing the death of another person and you can face a sentence of up to life in prison.
00:11:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, don't don't. I don't know, man, I don't know what do you do here? The child was born alive and the one person who had a decision to make about that child's life failed it. I don't know what the reasons were. I will be open minded to hear, but my goodness.
00:12:07
Speaker 2: It's devastating. And this is a tough, tough, tough case. The medical examiner in Kentucky they're determined, yes, that the baby was in fact born alive and the cause of death was listed as asphyxia by undetermined means. And I think this will be a big deal when and if this does go to court. Who knows she could make a plea deal with prosecutors that would possibly be a way forward in this case. But if it does go to trials, certainly that undetermined means will be in question because from what we hear from Lake and Snelling, by all accounts, she didn't intend to kill her baby. She says she fell asleep on top of him, that she was awake for about thirty minutes. She did say she heard the baby he she said he, So it was a little boy, make some whimpers. So she did acknowledge that the baby was born alive. That's of note. The medical examiner also agreed with that. So she never has tried to say that the baby was still born and she didn't know what to do. She has admitted that the baby was born alive. It's what happened next that is going.
00:13:13
Speaker 1: To fight about. In course, yes, she says she accidentally killed her child. Okay, jury determines that's the case, then it's a matter of her mistreating a corpse. But Vavee, that is that we are that is the case. Did she kill this baby or not?
00:13:34
Speaker 2: And the problem is the only person who knows is Lake and Snelling. No one else was in the room. Her roommates. By all accounts. No one even knew she was pregnant. No one has come forward saying they knew she was pregnant, that she talked about her pregnancy, that she talked about being nervous about not knowing what to do. This came as a surprise to the girls who lived with her. And look, you live with a bunch of girls off campus, been there, done that. It's hard to imagine that no one knew she was nine months pregnant. That's a remarkable thing to me to even get my head around. And then to only have reported hearing noises. Obviously, they thought something strange was going on, and they went into her room, and they investigated, and they found the baby wrapped up like a burrito. As how the baby was described in a trash bag in her closet. Now, she did say that she laid next to this baby to comfort the baby. Correct, that was what she told police, That this was giving her comfort and that the death was purely accidental. So look, we will have to wait and see what happens next. Again, she has a court hearing next month in April. Perhaps she'll say something, perhaps she won't. But her next arrayment is on April tenth. We will continue to follow this story, but it certainly is a sad one, and we certainly you know, it's hard to say if this was an accident, if this was a panicked moment, certainly the cover up after the fact. She's admitted to panicking and not knowing what to do. But this is just a heartbreaking story all around, and we just appreciate you listening to us update you on this latest information coming out of Kentucky. I'm Amy Roebuck alongside my partner T. J. Holmes. We will talk to you soon.