State: ‘Drugs and alcohol’ involved in infant’s death
Published 5:56 pm Wednesday, April 23, 2014
By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor
The Shelby County District Attorney’s Office has asked a judge to require a woman charged with the death of her infant son to submit to random drug and alcohol tests while she is out on bond, claiming the woman was “under the influence of both drugs and alcohol” when she was arrested.
In documents filed in Shelby County Circuit Court on April 16, Assistant Shelby County District Attorney Jeffrey Bradley requested Circuit Court Judge Dan Reeves require 22-year-old Sommer Nicole Wilford to submit to the random tests while she is out on bond awaiting trial.
Reeves is scheduled to rule on Bradley’s request during an April 29 hearing at the Shelby County Courthouse.
The Alabaster Police Department arrested Wilford and charged her with one count of reckless murder on Feb. 28 after responding to a report of a one-vehicle accident near the intersection of Alabama 119 and Kent Dairy Road.
According to Alabaster Police, when officers arrived on the scene, they found Wilford “standing outside the vehicle that was engulfed in flames.” After Alabaster firefighters extinguished the fire, they discovered the body of 19-month-old Jayden Allen inside the vehicle.
Wilford was released from the Shelby County Jail on March 20 after multiple individuals put their properties up as collateral on her $300,000 bond.
In his motion requesting random drug and alcohol tests be added as a condition of Wilford’s bond, Bradley wrote Wilford “is alleged to have been under the influence of both drugs and alcohol, well in excess of the legal limit, at the time of the death of Jayden Brodie Allen and that this level of intoxication directly contributed to and/or caused the death of” the infant.
“The defendant poses a real and present danger to herself, others and the public at large due to her past and present drug and/or alcohol use and/or abuse,” Bradley wrote.
Reckless murder is a Class A felony. If convicted, Wilford could face between 10 years and life in prison.