Police have made an arrest in the death of an infant whose body was found dumped along a highway in Galveston, Texas early last week. The man, who has since been identified as the child’s father, turned himself into Philadelphia police Friday, when he allegedly confessed to intentionally stomping the child to death.
On the morning of Tuesday, Jan. 29, Galveston-area residents Jesse Zaro Jr. and his wife, Esmeralda Zaro, were bird watching near the Galveston Seawall when they spotted something peculiar in an elevated, grassy area. At first glance the object appeared to be a doll; however, upon closer examination, the couple was horrified to discover it was the body of a small blonde child, clad in only a diaper. There was also a child's car seat laying in the grass, approximately 20 to 30 feet away. Shaken, Jesse grabbed his cell phone and dialed 911.
"Oh, oh God," Jesse said as the dispatcher answered his call. "I'm up here driving with my wife. I found a baby. I think there's a baby … No, the baby is dead. Uh, I'm walking up here. I can see a baby seat down here. I ain't never seen nothing like this before. Oh, it's horrible. Oh God, it's horrible! Oh God. Oh my God."
When investigators from the Galveston Police Department arrived at the location they secured the scene and photographed the infant’s body before it was removed by the medical examiner. A preliminary autopsy revealed the baby was a 3- to 6-month-old boy, with blonde hair and blue eyes. Injuries observed on his body suggested he had suffered severe blunt force trauma to the head. The condition of the body suggested that he had died within the last 24 hours.
"We think that the car seat was connected because of its location and we just have to assume that by the location of the car seat that the child was in the car seat at one time and became separated from the car seat," Lt. Jorge Trevino said in an interview with Click2houston.com.
As news spread across the airwaves, police were contacted by several local hospitals and informed that a woman had been calling the emergency rooms in search of her boyfriend and infant child. Police were able to identify the caller as 27-year-old Caren Kohberger. When they spoke with Kohberger, she said she had placed the calls because she was trying to determine if something had happened to her missing boyfriend, 21-year-old Travis "T.J." Mullis and their 3-month-old son, Alijah. When police showed Kohberger a photo of the unidentified infant, she broke down and identified it as her son.
According to Kohberger, she had not seen Mullis since approximately 5:30 that morning, when he left with their son to have his car repaired. Given that the child was found at approximately 9:00 a.m., it remains unclear why Kohberger had been calling emergency rooms looking for them. Regardless, police announced to the media that Mullis was wanted for questioning and issued an All Points Bulletin (APB) for him.
On Jan. 30, the Galveston County Medical Examiner's Office completed Alijah's autopsy and ruled his death a homicide by blunt force head trauma. According to police, the injuries were not caused, as some initial reports had suggested, by the infant and the child seat being tossed from a moving vehicle. Instead, the evidence suggests the injuries were physically inflicted upon the child prior to his being dumped by the side of the road.
The following day, Galveston police obtained a felony arrest warrant for Mullis on an unrelated case. According to police, they recently learned that sometime during January, Mullis allegedly enticed a child from her home, took her to a nearby park and asked her to remove her panties. When the child resisted, Mullis returned her home.
"The child became upset and the act stopped there," Trevino told Galvestondailynews.com, adding, "This charge puts us in better legal ground, now that we have a cause for arrest."
Both Kohberger and Mullis were active on the Internet. Prior to the birth of their child, Kohberger set up a profile at I-am-pregnant.com, a Web site about "everything pregnant" that allows users to create personal profiles, share their own pregnancy stories, and chat with others. On Nov. 2, 2007 she wrote:
"I went into the hospital late Sunday night after having dinner with my sister who flew in from New York. I walked into the room and started crying/freaking out … 5 am rolls around, and I get my water broken and I immediately thought I was going to feel this enormous pain, but I didn't … Around 12 pm I had only dilated to 4 cm so my dr said he wasn't going to wait anymore and to get me ready for a c-section … First, I was starting to be able to feel everything they were doing. Then I got really bad chest pains, nearly puked and had some trouble breathing, but everything turned out fine.
"Everything was good for 2 days until a nurse came into the room Tuesday morning and said she had to take Alijah to the nursery to be put under lights because he had jaundice. I wasn't too worried because jaundice is pretty common. However, his jaundice levels weren't coming down by Thursday, which was the day I was supposed to come home. So I started getting a little worried because he wasn't eating that well either and that's supposed to help get rid of the jaundice. Anyway, his doctor came in this morning and said his level was low enough for me to take him home. thank god. So I'm home now, still sore, Alijah's doing great...and I'm exhausted lol. He was 9lbs 6oz and 21 inches long when he was born. He dropped down to 8lbs 8oz when we left the hospital though." [SIC throughout].
According to the Web site, her profile was last updated three days ago; however, within it she makes no mention of Alijah's death.
Kohberger also has several other Internet profiles at social networking Web sites like Myyearbook.com and Fubar.com. Last week she posted a bulletin to her Fubar profile that read:
"I don’t want condolences about this situation. I am posting this bulletin with a link that includes pictures of the man who murdered my 3-month-old son, in hopes that maybe someone has seen him."
She last logged in to her Myyearbook.com account this morning, at which time she set the profile to private. Her Fubar.com profile was also recently set to private.
Like Kohberger, Mullis also had an Internet presence. In his own profile at Myyearbook.com, he described himself as horny DJ from Alvin, Texas. He described his interests as "Street racing, sex, my wife [and] my Son" and under the heading "I want to see this before I die," he wrote, "my son grow up." It would appear, assuming he is guilty, his priorities in that department recently changed.
The manhunt for Mullis came to an end Friday, when he walked into a Philadelphia police station and announced he wanted to talk about "something" he did in Texas. According to police, he then confessed to murdering his baby son, allegedly stating that he placed the infant on the ground and repeatedly stomped on his head until he his skull collapsed. No further details of the crime have been released.
"We have a pretty clear picture of what happened based on (Mullis') statements. But I can't release those details without risking hurting the case," Trevino told Dallasnews.com.
Trevino said Mullis bankrolled his 1,600-mile trip to Pennsylvania, where he is said to have relatives, by soliciting donations from churches along his route.
Following his confession, Mullis was charged with capital murder in Galveston and his bond has been set at $1 million. Investigators say it could take several weeks to extradite him back to Texas. In the meantime, they will continue to investigate the case, to determine if anyone else was involved in Alijah's murder. Police won’t comment on whether Kohberger is considered a suspect; however, they have stated they would like to question her further.
"We have more questions for her in order to wrap up the investigation," Trevino said. "But she is not cooperating with that."
On Saturday, Kohberger attended a memorial service for her son. According to the Houston Chronicle she read a letter that she wrote to her son.
"Mommy loves you so much," she said. "Thank you so much for giving me the best three months of my life."
Kohberger has refused to speak publicly about the case. Instead, family members have released the following statement to the media:
"We are glad Travis did the right thing and turned himself in. We pray the legal system will do its job and justice will be swift. But our main focus is Alijah. We want to remember Alijah as the beautiful baby boy he was."
Anyone with information about this case should contact the Galveston Police Department at 409-765-3702 or Crime Stoppers 409-763-8477.