A confession but no body: Is that enough to convict?

Appealed by Deb Ellis, TLC Staffer

By JOY POWELL, Star Tribune

Somewhere at Pine Bend Landfill, under 30 feet of dirt and trash, police believe there lies the skeleton of a slain baby, but they can't recover it. In a rare verdict, the baby girl's mother was convicted in 2008 of a murder in which a body wasn't found.

Now, in a highly unusual appeal to the state Supreme Court, the mother's attorney argues that Samantha Heiges of Burnsville was wrongfully convicted because state law says a person cannot be convicted solely on a confession; there must be separate evidence.

Attorney Deborah Ellis says not only is there no body, but nobody has been able to prove the infant, named Sydney, was born alive, and if she was, how she died. She also contends that three "confessions" to police and two friends should not have been used to corroborate one another.

Finish reading the article here!