FORT DODGE, Iowa — After a couple was arrested for allegedly drowning their newborn infant girl, the Fort Dodge Police Department is not closing the book until the baby is found.
“So obviously, yes, this case is clearly not over,” said Captain Dennis Quinn, with the Fort Dodge Police Department. “Now our focus has shifted to, not that it wasn’t before, but now it’s really going to be shifted to just trying to locate this infant.”
Brandon Thoma, 31, and Taylor Blaha, 24, are both charged with first-degree murder. Thoma is also charged with abuse of a corpse. According to an affidavit, there were several different locations that were points of interest for the police to search for the infant. One was the Kenyon Road Bridge, and the other was a rural area just north of the North Central Iowa Regional Landfill. Both of those extensive searches ended with officials not finding the baby’s body.
“Generally we have gotten, you know, people more than willing to come and help us. And that has been anything to investigative side to searching side,” said Quinn. “We’ve used different people to search wooded areas, dig in different locations, walk just paths throughout town, checking dumpsters, doing anything we could.”
Quinn added that the city will not leave a single stone unturned in the attempt to locate the newborn.
He encouraged any person who may know anything to contact the Fort Dodge Police Department or report it online at Crime Stoppers.