Alexis Avila (Hobbs Police Dept.)
A 19-year-old mother in New Mexico will spend more than a decade behind bars for stuffing her newborn baby in a plastic bag filled with trash and tossing it into a commercial dumpster behind a shopping mall early last year. A Lea County jury on Friday found Alexis Avila guilty on one count of attempted first-degree murder and one count of intentional child abuse resulting in great bodily harm, authorities announced.
“We are thankful that this jury honored the precious life of this baby boy and rejected the defendant’s self-serving excuses for this crime,” Lea County District Attorney Dianna Luce said in a statement after the verdict. “This verdict proves that children are entitled to the full protection of the law and that wrongdoers who hurt children in New Mexico will be prosecuted vigorously.”
Officers with the Hobbs Police Department and Emergency Medical Services personnel on Jan. 7, 2022, responded to a 911 call about a baby being found in a dumpster located in the 1400 block of N. Thorp behind a Rig Outfitters and Home Store near the state’s eastern border with Texas. Upon arriving at the scene at approximately 8 p.m., first responders found two males standing near the dumpster and a female sitting inside a vehicle holding the baby, Hobbs’ interim Police Chief August Fons said during a news conference after the discovery.
Authorities said the baby was wrapped in a bath towel that was dirty and wet and had dried blood on him and the umbilical cord was still attached. EMS rendered aid before rushing the child to a local hospital for treatment. Shortly after arriving at the facility, the newborn was transported via airlift to Lubbock Hospital in Texas for more specialized pediatric treatment
The three people who found the baby told investigators they were looking for “anything of value” that may have been thrown away when they heard crying coming from a black garbage bag. Thinking it was a dog or a cat, they removed the bag only to discover the newborn. The female then took the baby into the car and held him to keep him warm while one of the men called for help.
Investigators then obtained surveillance camera footage from the owner of Rig Outfitters, which showed a white four-door Volkswagen Jetta pulling into the nearly empty parking lot and stopping in front of a line of three large green dumpsters at approximately 2 p.m. A woman exits the driver’s side door and opens the back passenger door. She then grabs a black bag from the backseat and throws it into the open dumpster farthest to the right before getting back in the vehicle and driving off. The entire incident took less than 30 seconds, but based on the footage, Fons said the baby was in the dumpster for approximately six hours.
“That video said it all,” Luce said Friday, according to a report from Albuquerque CBS and Fox affiliate KRQE. “It clearly caught her actions, her expressions and it’s still difficult for people to watch that video when you think about the fact that baby was inside that bag.”
Avila is scheduled to appear before Circuit Court Judge William G. W. Shoobridge on May 1 for her sentencing hearing, court records show.
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