We now have discovered that the physique of lacking baby Melodee Buzzard (9) was discovered December 6, 2025. The information broke on December 23. Melodee’s physique was present in Caineville, Utah earlier within the month and as soon as the stays had been confirmed to belong to her, it hit the media. Her mom Ashlee has now been arrested and charged along with her homicide.
“The detective referred to as me this morning to let me know that they discovered the newborn and the newborn is along with her dad,” Melodee’s paternal grandmother, Lilly Denes, instructed The Instances. “I knew he was telling me that the newborn is lifeless.”
In relation to the realm the place Melodee was discovered, Caineville is an unincorporated group in central Wayne County, Utah, United States. It’s a very rural, distant space with the final inhabitants figures being 20 in 1950. Caineville is round 750 miles/1200 kms -11.5 hour drive from Lompoc in California the place Melodee and Ashlee had been final seen.
This details about the scene is from CNN:
Because the December solar set over central Utah’s sandstone peaks, a pair ventured down a nondescript filth highway to snap photographs in opposition to the backdrop of a pink rock vista. As a substitute, they stumbled throughout a grisly discovery amongst smattered shrubs and parched soil: the decomposed stays of just a little woman.
When sheriff’s deputies arrived within the sparsely populated stretch of Caineville, it was clear they might be investigating a murder. The unidentifiable woman had died from gunshot wounds to her head, authorities later mentioned.
After the unidentified physique was discovered, a lab in Utah analyzed gadgets left on the scene, in keeping with the sheriff in Wayne County.
“In lower than 24 hours, the Crime Lab obtained affirmation that the Wayne County case was related to the Santa Barbara case,” Sheriff Micah Gulley mentioned in a press release.
Santa Barbara County Sheriff-Coroner Invoice Brown mentioned that the suspect in Melodee’s demise was the individual the kid had “trusted probably the most on this world.”
“This stage of felony exercise is especially surprising given the calculated, cold-blooded and criminally refined premeditation and heartlessness that went into planning it,” Sheriff Brown mentioned. “We now have recovered a big quantity of proof that clearly signifies that this heinous crime was dedicated by Ashlee Buzzard, Melodee’s mom.”
The examination of a spent shell casing present in Ashlee’s house matched what was discovered on the scene in Utah, and stay comparable rounds had been present in Ashlee’s automobile, officers mentioned.
Authorities have confirmed that Melodee died from a number of gunshot wounds, together with at the very least one to the pinnacle.
Melodee was final seen on video with Ashlee on October 9 close to the Colorado and Utah state line. Detectives now imagine Melodee was killed shortly after this sighting, in keeping with regulation enforcement.
Ashlee returned house to California the day after this last sighting.
On December 22 , the FBI Crime Lab was in a position to decide that the stays from Utah had been a “familial DNA match” to Ashlee, and investigators received a warrant to arrest her on suspicion of homicide.
Ashlee was charged with first-degree homicide in her daughter’s killing, which a felony grievance mentioned was carried out with distinctive “cruelty” and “viciousness.”
Ashlee appeared in court docket on December 26 and pleaded not responsible.
Prosecutors mentioned they might not search the demise penalty if she is convicted, however would as a substitute ask for all times in jail with out parole.
“Melodee deserved a much better life,” Sheriff Brown mentioned. “She is going to by no means be forgotten.”
Sheriff Brown additionally spoke about Melodee’s prolonged household.
“Their power, their persistence and their steadfast hope have been evident from the very starting,” he mentioned. “No household ought to ever need to expertise this sort of loss, and our hearts are with them immediately and can be with them within the troublesome days forward.”
He later added, “Might God bless the harmless soul of Melodee Elani Buzzard, who we are going to by no means, ever overlook.”
We now have discovered extra about Ashlee’s youth.
When Ashlee was simply 9 years previous — the identical age as Melodee when she went lacking — she and her mom, Lori Miranda, turned homeless after fleeing Ashlee’s abusive father, Miranda instructed the Santa Maria Instances in 1995.
The article, titled “Classes From the College of Laborious Knocks,” describes how Lori and Ashlee arrived on the streets of Santa Maria with no job, house or automobile and solely $40 to assist them.
They’d beforehand moved from place to put to get away from Lori’s husband, who she mentioned struggled with substance use and episodes of violence. In June 1994, Lori determined to take her daughter from Orange County to the Central Coast to be farther away from him, and so they briefly lived on the Good Samaritan Shelter in Santa Maria earlier than transferring into an condo.
“I used to be so scared,” Ashlee instructed the paper, describing her early days in Santa Maria. “I knew nobody [here]. I felt very uncomfortable.”
When Ashlee was within the eleventh grade at Santa Maria Excessive College, she filed a petition to be emancipated from her mom, in keeping with court docket data. The choose rejected the petition, noting that Ashlee was nonetheless dwelling along with her mom and had not submitted sufficient data pertaining to her earnings and bills.
It is a creating story and this weblog can be up to date.
SOURCE LIST
https://version.cnn.com/2025/12/26/us/melodee-ashlee-buzzard-investigation
