St. Cloud woman who stabbed 3-month-old child sentenced to 22 years

ST. CLOUD - A Stearns County judge on Thursday sentenced a 29-year-old St. Cloud woman to nearly 22 years in prison for stabbing her 3-month-old son, wrapping him in a plastic garbage bag and leaving him in a dumpster outside her apartment building.

Fardoussa O. Abdillahi was charged with one felony count of premeditated first-degree murder and one felony count of intentional second-degree murder following the November 2021 incident.

She was found incompetent to stand trial in February 2022 following a diagnosis of postpartum psychosis and later found competent to move forward with the case.

According to court documents, officers were dispatched to an apartment building in the 2000 block of Maine Prairie Road at about 6:30 a.m. on Nov. 28, 2021, after a man called 911 to report a baby was missing and the mother stated “she had thrown the baby in the dumpster.”

The child, born in August 2021, lived in the apartment with Abdillahi. Adult witnesses on the scene told police they arrived at the residence after a call from Abdillahi’s mother expressing concern based on comments she had made.

Officers found the child’s body in the dumpster, along with multiple knives and bedding.

Abdillahi told investigators she was experiencing headaches and feelings of worry and fear after the child was born, and was upset the father was “denying the child was his,” documents state.

On Thursday, the state requested the maximum sentence of about 30 years in prison. Abdillahi’s attorney, Kenneth L. Wilson, argued for a downward departure to sentencing guidelines, based on her severe mental illness and hallucinations. In many countries, Wilson said, there are infanticide laws that treat mothers with postpartum psychosis “as mentally ill and not criminals.”

Wilson said that before the stabbing, Abdillahi had attempted to leave the child outside in the cold “as she was instructed by the hallucinations, but later searched for and retrieved the child as she felt bad for it. This shows the active provocation that the hallucinations had on her at the time. It further shows the lapse in cognitive abilities as she did not know where the child was located and had to search for it.”

Judge Sarah Hennesy denied Wilson’s motion for the sentencing departure, but sentenced Abdillahi to the minimum sentence allowed under guidelines — about 22 years.