A day after allegedly admitting to St. Paul police that she had drowned her 6-year-old daughter, Kayla Marie Jones was charged Wednesday with second-degree murder and ordered to undergo a mental health evaluation.
Jones, 25, drowned the girl to "save her from this world," she was quoted as saying in a Ramsey County District Court complaint.
In a brief court appearance Wednesday afternoon, Jones was asked by District Judge Shawn Bartsch if she understood that she would be seen by a doctor who would offer an opinion on her ability to participate in court proceedings. Jones replied simply, "Yes."
Also in the courtroom was the dead girl's father. He later left the law enforcement center without speaking with reporters.
About 8:10 a.m. Tuesday, officers responding to a call about a girl drowned in a bathtub arrived at an apartment building in the 1300 block of Maynard Avenue E. in the Highland Park neighborhood to find the suspect's boyfriend crying and screaming, charges say.
"Is this really happening? This can't be happening!" he said. "Things aren't that bad. How could she do this to her daughter?"
Jones, showing no emotion, with her clothes soaking wet, raised her hands as if in surrender when an officer approached. She was then arrested.
Later, at police headquarters, Jones told a police sergeant that she believed her daughter, Azaria Nicole Jones, had been molested, and that she put the girl in the tub and held her face down as she kicked and thrashed, after watching television and hearing: "Save the child, don't send him … to the monster," authorities say.
