Kentucky cheerleader Laken Snelling has pleaded not guilty in court to manslaughter charges as prosecutors accused her of killing her newborn baby and hiding its body in her closet.
Snelling, 22, was arrested in August 2025 after investigators say they found a baby boy wrapped in a blood-soaked towel and a trash bag in her dorm at the University of Kentucky.
The cheerleader was initially charged with abuse of a corpse, tampering with physical evidence and concealing the birth of an infant, and she pleaded not guilty to those charges in September.
She was then indicted again in March 2026 on first-degree manslaughter charges, as prosecutors accused her of suffocating the infant in a panic after secretly giving birth.
In court on Friday, Snelling pleaded not guilty to the additional charges. Her pretrial date was set for May 14, and a status hearing was set for June 12.
Snelling has been on house arrest in her parents' Tennessee home since her first arraignment last September, and in March she posted a $10,000 bond to be re-released following her second indictment.
The former cheerleader at the University of Kentucky now faces a maximum of 20 years in prison if convicted on the manslaughter charges, and an additional 11 years for the remaining counts.
Kentucky cheerleader Laken Snelling has pleaded not guilty in court to manslaughter charges as prosecutors accused her of killing her newborn baby and hiding its body in her closet
The cheerleader was initially charged with abuse of a corpse, tampering with physical evidence and concealing the birth of an infant, and she pleaded not guilty to those charges in September. She was then indicted again in March 2026 on first-degree manslaughter charges
Snelling made headlines last year when the body of her newborn son was discovered hidden in a closet in her off-campus apartment by her horrified roommates.
The cheerleader was first charged on August 30, 2025, three days after she gave birth.
Her roommates told police that they believed she was concealing a pregnancy for some time, and photos from last April shows Snelling performing with UK's STUNT team with what appears to be a pregnant bump on her stomach.
Her roommates told police they heard strange noises coming from her room during labor, as the cheerleader gave birth alone and in secret in her dorm room.
After giving birth, Snelling allegedly cleaned up the scene and left her home to go to McDonald's.
Her roommates said they then discovered the newborn baby dead in a blood-soaked towel on the floor of her closet, wrapped in a plastic bag.
One friend said she reported to police that the infant was 'cold to the touch' when they found him.
Following Snelling's arrest, she initially claimed the newborn was stillborn.
She said she didn't believe the baby was 'breathing or alive', and then claimed to have passed out 'on top of the baby', and woke up to find him 'turning blue and purple.'
Snelling made headlines last year when the body of her newborn son was discovered hidden in a closet in her off-campus apartment by her horrified roommates
Snelling was believed by her friends to have been hiding her pregnancy before allegedly disposing of the newborn when she gave birth in August, police said. Photos from last April shows Snelling performing with UK's STUNT team with what appears to be a pregnant bump on her stomach
Court documents said Snelling told investigators she wrapped her newborn up 'like a burrito' and 'laid next to it', explaining that she was panicking and it 'gave her a little comfort in the moment.'
Police later alleged that Snelling told a medical worker that her newborn had shown 'a little bit of fetal movement', and made a 'whimper' when he was born.
As officers continued to investigate in the days that followed, they executed a search warrant on Snelling's phone and requested access to her Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook, and a shared iCloud account with her mother.
The probe revealed that Snelling had made a number of Internet searches 'including different things pertaining to pregnancy', the search also uncovered 'images of her during labor, photos of her doing things ordinary pregnant woman should not be doing and a concealed or hidden pregnancy,' the affidavit said.
'Other items could have also been deleted in an attempt to hide any evidence of the pregnancy, birth and newborn baby,' Lexington police note, including information related to 'the birth of the full-term baby.'
Authorities also found that her phone contained 'images of her during labor,' which she allegedly 'deleted in an attempt to hide the birth.'
Her indictment on manslaughter charges in March followed a report by the Kentucky Medical Examiner's Office that found her baby was born alive but died from asphyxia.
In exclusive Daily Mail images, the former cheerleader was spotted in October 2025 walking the streets after she was placed under house arrest
Snelling, 22, was hit with additional charges of manslaughter earlier this year following a report by the Kentucky Medical Examiner's Office that found her baby was born alive and the cause of death was asphyxia
It is unclear whether Snelling, who has since dropped out of school, had told anyone she was pregnant before giving birth.
In June 2025, she had shared images where her then-boyfriend, former college basketball star Connor Jordan, 24, where she seemed to cover her front.
She has not publicly disclosed who the father is.
However, the Daily Mail previously revealed Snelling was previously in a relationship with college quarterback Izaiah Hall who underwent a DNA test to determine whether the baby was his back in September.
The results of the DNA test have not been publicly disclosed, and it is unclear who the father of Snelling's baby was.
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