Initial Appearance for Fetus-Snatch Suspect
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A woman accused of killing an expectant mother and cutting the baby from her womb made her initial appearance Tuesday before a federal judge in Missouri.
Federal prosecutors have charged Lisa Montgomery (search), 36, of Melvern, Kan., with kidnapping resulting in death. She is accused of strangling eight-months-pregnant Bobbie Jo Stinnett (search) and cutting the baby from her womb during a Dec. 16 attack at Stinnett's home in Skidmore.
Tuesday's hearing before U.S. Magistrate Judge John T. Maughmer lasted less than 10 minutes. Montgomery answered a series of questions about whether she qualifies financially for a public defender, and Maughmer said it appeared she would.
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It wasn't clear if the two public defenders who appeared with Montgomery during the hearing would continue to handle her case.
Montgomery is scheduled to return to court Thursday for a detention hearing, and prosecutors have already asked she be denied bond.
Stinnett, 23, was found by her mother in a pool of blood on Dec. 16. Officials said Montgomery, on that same day, called her husband from Topeka, Kan., and told him she had just delivered a baby.
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Authorities said the baby was found Dec. 17 with Montgomery and her husband in Melvern. The infant, named Victoria Jo Stinnett (search), spent that weekend in a Topeka hospital before going home with her widowed father, Zeb Stinnett.