Mom Carries Murdered Baby to Funeral Home, Places Her in Hearse in Middle of Night: Police

Terica Pearl, 29, was arrested and charged with murder on Sunday, August 10 after the shocking discovery early on the morning of August 9, by an employee of West Gadsden Funeral Home. She was booked into the Etowah County Jail and is being held without bond, per NBC affiliate WVTM.

The funeral home's director, Dantez Robinson, who is also the area's assistant coroner, said they were "just shocked" to find the body of Blessence Pearl inside the hearse, which he said had been locked and empty the night before.

"To see that and to see my employee in disbelief, I was lost for words when I put the call out to the police department," Robinson told AL.com. He also said that the funeral home intends to have a burial for the child: "We're going to give this baby the proper burial. To have life taken so early, we're going to stand up and bury this baby."

The Etowah County Coroner's Office confirmed the child's age at 21 months old, as well as her alleged cause of death, according to police. While the autopsy has not yet been released, police have said the child died of strangulation, per Fox affiliate WBRC. The piece of material investigators believe was used to kill the child was approximately the same thickness as a shoelace.

Appearing in court in Etowah County on August 22, the outlet reported that Pearl was emotional at times, wiping away tears when the condition of the deceased was described. While laying out their case against her, prosecutors turned to the alleged murder weapon, which they say came from a garment Pearl was wearing at the presumed time of death.

Investigators detailed the surveillance video they recovered, which purportedly shows Pearl in the robe walking around outside at approximately 2:30 a.m. while carrying Blessence, who can visibly be seen moving her head around, indicating she was still alive at that time. She was reportedly walking in the direction of the funeral home.

For the next two-and-a-half hours, there is no footage that captures Pearl, as she had walked out of the shot recovered. At approximately 5 a.m., according to investigators, Pearl shows up again on the surveillance footage, this time with no child in her arms.

"You can see where the string was ripped from the garment," Gadsden Police Sgt. Nick Keener, who was the lead investigator in the case, told the court on Friday. Police said they found the robe that Pearl was seen wearing in the video on the night of the murder in a bag inside her car, and that the material matched the "string" wrapped around the child's neck.

According to the investigation, after walking back from the area of the funeral home, Pearl allegedly got into her car and drove to Huntsville, Alabama, where she showed up at a hotel. A worker there told police, per WBRC, that they thought Pearl was under the influence, and so she was directed to a recovery center.

It was at this facility she was arrested and first interviewed by police the following day. When she was asked why she had walked to the funeral home on the night of Blessence's murder and then driven to Huntsville, police say that Pearl told them it was because she felt "compelled to."

According to detectives in court, they asked Pearl if she talked to her baby during the walk to the funeral home. She reportedly told them she asked if her daughter if she felt safe. Investigators say she eventually became hysterical during the course of the interview, per WBRC, and began screaming, "Oh my god, what have I done?"

Pearl's defense team has argued there is not enough evidence to prove that Pearl is guilty of murdering her baby. They're also calling for the records for both Blessence and Terica from the Department of Human Resources (DHR) to be made available as "those records would be illuminous to how we all got here today," said attorney Shaun Malone.