Lady Who Killed Boyfriend’s Daughter, Left Physique In Bucket on Mother’s Entrance Garden Learns Destiny

Bunnak “Hannah” Landon was sentenced to life in jail with out the potential of parole for the first-degree homicide of Bella Fontenelle, 6. She was additionally reportedly given 80 years for obstruction of justice.

The sentencing comes after she was discovered responsible of each crimes earlier this month, after she pleaded not responsible by motive of madness. Per the DA, “Her attorneys argued she couldn’t be held legally liable for Bella’s loss of life as a result of a psychological defect prevented her from distinguishing proper from mistaken.”

“She knew what she did was mistaken,” Assistant District Lawyer Lindsay Truhe reportedly informed jurors in closing argument. “She simply didn’t care. She is simply evil.”

Landon met the lady’s father whereas working as a stripper at a neighborhood gentleman’s membership. The 2 then embarked upon what the DA known as a “cohabitating romantic relationship wherein Landon typically sorted Bella and her older sister at his residence.”

The horrific discovery of 6-year-old Bella’s physique occurred on April 25, 2023, when her father was working late and Landon watched the children. Her stays had been discovered hours after the lady’s father — who went to mattress upon returning residence, assuming the children and Landon had been asleep — awakened the following morning and realized his girlfriend, Landon, and daughter had been lacking.

In response to a press launch from Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Workplace on the time, authorities first responded to the dad’s residence, earlier than shifting their investigation to the house of the kid’s organic mom lower than two blocks away. It was Bella’s grandmother who first noticed a “massive plastic bucket” that morning at her daughter’s residence, amid the seek for the kid, per the DA.

The lady’s mom investigated and noticed blood. “She was unable to unscrew its lid. She instinctively knew it was her second-born,” stated the DA, earlier than the sufferer’s stays had been discovered inside, “clad in pink pajamas with white polka dots.”

Landon was rapidly recognized as a suspect, after Ring digital camera footage from the world allegedly confirmed her pulling a wagon containing a bucket down the streets of each properties round 9:35 pm on Tuesday night — 5 minutes earlier than the lady’s father received residence.

Within the chilling video, a girl police say is Landon might be seen casually pulling the wagon behind her, not altering her tempo or reacting in any manner as a white SUV passes proper by her. After inserting the bucket on the mother’s garden, she introduced the empty wagon again to her boyfriend’s residence after which left, by no means to return.

An post-mortem confirmed the kid’s loss of life was a murder, with the coroner revealing the kid suffered blunt pressure trauma accidents to her head and died by strangulation. Landon’s blood was additionally allegedly discovered on the bucket.

In a single day, Landon had allegedly walked into the native police division — the place she “was uncooperative with the officers who questioned her and offered aliases.” She agreed to go to a close-by hospital, the place she was arrested.

Per the DA, Landon stated she positioned her cellphone in a plastic bag and buried it by a tree within the neighborhood. Upon recovering the cellphone, the Sheriff’s Workplace “later discovered that shortly earlier than she killed Bella, Landon video-recorded the kid in her bed room crying, repeating again and again by means of her tears, ‘I need my grandma.'”

The discharge notes that, “In flip, Landon positioned a shower towel on the backside of Bella’s bed room door to dampen the sound of her cries.”

The cellphone additionally allegedly confirmed she despatched texts to Bella’s father claiming they had been “tucked of their beds and that the tooth fairy had visited Bella’s older sister,” whereas she “repeatedly” looked for a legal protection lawyer.

Extra messages despatched after the homicide to “two of her stripper pals” allegedly learn, “All the time bear in mind me as Valentine” — her dancer identify — and “I will at all times bear in mind the great occasions we had.” She additionally texted an ex-boyfriend’s mom — who was elevating two of her kids — saying, “I am at peace with what I’ve determined to do” earlier than the killing.

Throughout the trial, her attorneys and psychiatrists argued she was affected by a “psychotic episode” when the homicide occurred — and solely remembered “Bella clawing at her personal neck and to holding Bella’s physique whereas listening to Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata.”

One witness stated she additionally suffered from a “post-traumatic stress dysfunction rooted in her childhood in a Khmer Rouge loss of life camp in her native Cambodia.”

Witnesses for the prosecution, nevertheless, claimed that whereas Landon doubtless has a persona dysfunction, she was sane when she killed the lady.

As for why she did it? One witness, per the DA’s launch, stated Bella was in baby counseling and stated Landon “was imply to her” earlier than her loss of life.

“With the assistance of counseling, Bella labored up the braveness to confide in her father about Landon. That in flip led her father to confront Landon,” stated the DA, claiming the daddy informed Landon “he would ‘reassess’ their relationship if he heard this from his daughter once more.”

The lady was killed the following day.