Phoenix mother arrested after ‘beating her daughter and dumping her body in dumpster’ on Christmas

News

By Alyssa Guzman

A Phoenix mother was arrested for murder after her daughter was found dead in a dumpster on Christmas Eve.

Sophia Simmons, 38, was busted after cops received a tip that she had placed her daughter’s body in a dumpster after the child was allegedly brutally beaten and died.

A witness, who lives in New York, allegedly received a phone call from Simmons on Christmas Day and claimed the mother had confessed to having “beaten her child and it went too far,” according to ABC 15.

The girl was not named and is believed to be between five and seven years old. She was found on Sunday around 8 p.m. inside the dumpster in a storage container.

A witness had gone into the dumpster in search of firewood when they noticed the container’s lid was not properly on. When they looked inside, they found the child’s body and told a nearby security guard, who called the police.

Officers found the girl’s body with multiple injuries to the legs, arms, and torso. Investigators believe the wounds were at multiple stages of healing and the girl had scars from previous attacks, ABC 15 reported.

The New York witness also revealed that Simmons had left the body after allegedly beating the child and when she returned, the girl was not breathing.

She stayed with the body for five days, a police report said, before taking it to the dumpster.

After securing a search warrant, police found evidence of someone trying to cover a crime scene, ABC 15 reported. Simmons was not at home during the search.

Police tracked her phone and found her in California en route back to Arizona. She was stopped outside of Phoenix and taken to police headquarters, the local outlet reported.

Phone records also showed her device was near the dumpster around 10:30 a.m. on Sunday.

She was booked into jail on first-degree murder, child abuse, and tampering with evidence.