A former Iowa City woman, who is accused of putting her newborn son in a trash receptacle that was taken to the landfill in 1992, is asking a judge to dismiss her case because there’s no evidence the baby was killed.
Cindy Sue Elder, 59, was extradited from Christian County, Missouri, to Iowa City in September 2025 and charged with first-degree murder.
Elder’s lawyers filed a motion to dismiss last month in Johnson County District Court, arguing the infant could have been stillborn because there’s no evidence the infant was born alive in 1992. An autopsy showed the baby’s cause of death couldn’t be determined, the motion states.
Elder also argues investigators with the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation influenced her answers in 2025. She said she denied killing the baby more than once during an interview and that her recollection, nearly 30 years later, was “partial and hazy at best,” according to the motion.
Elder’s defense said the investigators first suggested Elder was trying to keep the baby from crying because Elder didn’t want her aunt to hear and come down to the basement, where Elder was living in Iowa City at the time.
More than an hour later in the interview, Elder said she didn’t think she had killed the baby and a few minutes later, she said she didn’t recall any crying. She recalled hearing “gasping for air but wasn’t sure who that noise was coming from,” according to the motion.
Elder also didn’t recall the answers she’d given to many of the investigators’ questions regarding the disposal of the body, the motion stated. She didn’t remember putting the infant’s body in a car trunk or seeing a trash can where she allegedly dropped off the garbage bag that contained the body.
The defense said the prosecution’s case lacks any corroborating evidence the baby was born alive, so a homicide can’t be proven based on an admission Elder made when that confession isn’t corroborated by “substantial independent evidence.”
The prosecution had not responded to the motion as of Thursday afternoon.
Elder remains in the Johnson County Jail in lieu of posting a $1 million bond.
According to criminal complaint, investigators believe Elder disposed of the baby in 1992, shortly after giving birth in the basement of a residence where she was living in Iowa City. Elder was 26 at the time and had concealed her pregnancy from the father of the child and from her family and friends.
According to court documents, the body of the full-term infant — a boy with brown hair and blue eyes — was found in the Iowa City landfill Dec. 21, 1992, by workers. The baby had been unknowingly picked up by a trash collector near an apartment building in Coralville.
The baby had extensive blunt force injuries that appeared to have happened after his death. The placenta was still attached and wrapped around the child’s neck, according to the complaint.
An autopsy stated the cause and manner of death were undetermined because “the lack of known circumstances surrounding the labor and delivery of this infant make it impossible at this time,” the complaint stated.
Iowa City police investigators hadn’t been able to identify the infant because the DNA tissue sample was “degraded and contaminated.” The advanced testing helped investigators identify the “Johnson County John Doe (1992),” as he was initially known in the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, after using genealogy to piece together a familial connection, Michael Vogen, director of case management at Othram, told The Gazette earlier this year.
The results of the DNA testing led investigators to Elder in 2022.
She told police she didn’t want to be a parent when she was 26 and hid her pregnancy from everyone, including the father of the baby. She never went to a doctor for prenatal care, and she had attempted to induce a miscarriage by punching herself in the stomach, according to the complaint.
She gave birth to the baby and told police the baby was born alive and crying, the complaint stated. She “did something” to keep the baby quiet so no one in the house heard any crying. She then put the baby in a garbage bag and dropped off the bag in an outdoor trash receptacle near her father’s apartment at 712 Fifth St. in Coralville.
The father of the infant told police he wasn’t aware of Elder’s pregnancy or that she had given birth.
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Cindy Sue Elder, 59, was extradited from Christian County, Missouri, to Iowa City in September 2025 and charged with first-degree murder.
Elder’s lawyers filed a motion to dismiss last month in Johnson County District Court, arguing the infant could have been stillborn because there’s no evidence the infant was born alive in 1992. An autopsy showed the baby’s cause of death couldn’t be determined, the motion states.
Elder also argues investigators with the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation influenced her answers in 2025. She said she denied killing the baby more than once during an interview and that her recollection, nearly 30 years later, was “partial and hazy at best,” according to the motion.
Elder’s defense said the investigators first suggested Elder was trying to keep the baby from crying because Elder didn’t want her aunt to hear and come down to the basement, where Elder was living in Iowa City at the time.
More than an hour later in the interview, Elder said she didn’t think she had killed the baby and a few minutes later, she said she didn’t recall any crying. She recalled hearing “gasping for air but wasn’t sure who that noise was coming from,” according to the motion.
Elder also didn’t recall the answers she’d given to many of the investigators’ questions regarding the disposal of the body, the motion stated. She didn’t remember putting the infant’s body in a car trunk or seeing a trash can where she allegedly dropped off the garbage bag that contained the body.
The defense said the prosecution’s case lacks any corroborating evidence the baby was born alive, so a homicide can’t be proven based on an admission Elder made when that confession isn’t corroborated by “substantial independent evidence.”
The prosecution had not responded to the motion as of Thursday afternoon.
Elder remains in the Johnson County Jail in lieu of posting a $1 million bond.
Criminal complaint
According to criminal complaint, investigators believe Elder disposed of the baby in 1992, shortly after giving birth in the basement of a residence where she was living in Iowa City. Elder was 26 at the time and had concealed her pregnancy from the father of the child and from her family and friends.
According to court documents, the body of the full-term infant — a boy with brown hair and blue eyes — was found in the Iowa City landfill Dec. 21, 1992, by workers. The baby had been unknowingly picked up by a trash collector near an apartment building in Coralville.
The baby had extensive blunt force injuries that appeared to have happened after his death. The placenta was still attached and wrapped around the child’s neck, according to the complaint.
An autopsy stated the cause and manner of death were undetermined because “the lack of known circumstances surrounding the labor and delivery of this infant make it impossible at this time,” the complaint stated.
DNA evidence
The 33-year-old cold case was solved with advanced DNA testing developed by Othram in The Woodlands, Texas. The Iowa Attorney General’s Office reached out to Othram in 2021 for help on the case. Othram developed the advanced DNA testing — forensic-grade genome sequencing — in 2018.Iowa City police investigators hadn’t been able to identify the infant because the DNA tissue sample was “degraded and contaminated.” The advanced testing helped investigators identify the “Johnson County John Doe (1992),” as he was initially known in the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, after using genealogy to piece together a familial connection, Michael Vogen, director of case management at Othram, told The Gazette earlier this year.
The results of the DNA testing led investigators to Elder in 2022.
She told police she didn’t want to be a parent when she was 26 and hid her pregnancy from everyone, including the father of the baby. She never went to a doctor for prenatal care, and she had attempted to induce a miscarriage by punching herself in the stomach, according to the complaint.
She gave birth to the baby and told police the baby was born alive and crying, the complaint stated. She “did something” to keep the baby quiet so no one in the house heard any crying. She then put the baby in a garbage bag and dropped off the bag in an outdoor trash receptacle near her father’s apartment at 712 Fifth St. in Coralville.
The father of the infant told police he wasn’t aware of Elder’s pregnancy or that she had given birth.
Woman wants murder charge dropped in Iowa City cold case
A former Iowa City woman, who is accused of putting her newborn son in a trash receptacle that was taken to the landfill in 1992, is asking a judge to dismiss her case because there’s no evidence the baby was killed.
