North Texas ‘Angel Baby Doe’ Case Solved – NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth

Investigators have solved a decades-old cold case involving the death of “Angel Baby Doe,” a newborn whose body was found on the side of a road near Fort Worth in November 2001, authorities said.

The girl’s body was found in November 2001 in Johnson County, between the towns of Alvarado and Burleson.

According to the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office, the baby was likely born alive and outside a medical facility. She was abandoned on the side of Briar Oaks Road, wrapped in a jacket, with the umbilical cord still attached.

Steve Shaw, a retired Johnson County detective, was one of the first people to arrive at the scene.

“I can look at the photos and I can probably make a photo journal for you with all the photos. They’re very vivid,” Shaw said.

Sheriff’s deputies said a resident was collecting cans along the street when he found the dead newborn wrapped in a jacket with the umbilical cord still attached. Upon arrival, Johnson County sheriff’s deputies determined the infant was a girl, and because her identity was unknown, they named her “Angel Baby Doe.”

The sheriff’s office said that given the circumstances surrounding the child’s death, investigators concluded her death was the result of a crime.

Investigators like Shaw have been following these leads for years.

“We interviewed a lot of people, took a lot of cheek swabs, but we didn’t find any matches,” Shaw recalls.

Shaw retired in 2017 but continued to fight for justice in the case.

In June 2021, more than 20 years after Angel Baby Doe’s death, Johnson County investigators presented forensic evidence to Othram of The Woodlands, Texas, hoping to identify the child through advanced DNA testing.

“Othram scientists successfully developed a DNA profile of the infant and then used Forensic-Grade Genome Sequencing® to build a comprehensive DNA profile of the child,” the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release Tuesday.

“Othram’s in-house team of forensic genealogists then used this profile to conduct extensive genealogical research, ultimately providing new investigative leads to law enforcement.”

In 2022, the Sheriff’s Office also requested assistance from the Texas Attorney General’s Unsolved Cases and Missing Persons Unit to investigate new leads.

In September 2023, the Attorney General’s Office announced that DNA collected from “Angel Baby Doe” and 48-year-old Shelby Stotts indicated that Stotts is the child’s biological mother.

“Additional evidence indicates that the child was alive and breathing at the time of birth and that Stotts is liable for abandoning the child,” the attorney general’s office said in an email Monday.

Stotts was charged and arrested on Monday.

According to the indictment, “Stotts recklessly caused the death of her newborn daughter by leaving the child unattended on the side of the road, failing to seek immediate medical attention after delivery, and failing to clamp the child’s umbilical cord, causing the child to bleed to death.”

She was charged with second-degree murder and remained in the Johnson County Jail Tuesday night on $100,000 bail.

Stotts declined NBC 5’s request for an interview.

Cleburne ISD said Stotts was a support worker at Cleburne High School.

In a statement, the district said, “The Cleburne Independent School District is aware of the arrest and grand jury indictment of Shelby Stotts. Cleburne ISD takes these allegations very seriously. Shelby Stotts is no longer employed by Cleburne ISD. The district intends to follow board policy and state law and fully investigate the matter. Because this is a personnel matter, the district is unable to provide further details or comment on the matter in accordance with state law and board policy.”