Police in San Jose said Friday they have arrested a woman suspected in the fentanyl poisoning death of her toddler earlier this year.
Kelly Gene Richardson, 28, was taken into custody on Wednesday and is set to appear in court on Nov. 27 on murder charges.
The girl's father, Derek Vaughn Rayo, 27, was already in custody.
Prosecutors say the child's parents had fentanyl and other opioids in their systems at the time of their 18-month-old daughter's death at their San Jose home in the 1500 block of Huddersfield Court.
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If convicted, the suspects each face at least 15 years to life in prison.
It is the first time the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office has charged parents for the murder of their own child in a fentanyl-related death, according to prosecutors.
At about 11 p.m. on Aug. 12, San Jose police officers went to the home on Huddersfield Court in response to Rayo's call that his daughter was not conscious and not breathing.
She was later found to have been dead for hours, according to prosecutors.
"During a search of the home, investigators located fentanyl on the nightstand of the master bedroom, a scraping tool with fentanyl residue on the desk, and another scraping tool with fentanyl on a rug located underneath the baby's body," prosecutors said in a news release on Wednesday.
Earlier this month, police were notified by the Santa Clara County Coroner's Office that a lethal concentration of fentanyl was found in the child's blood.
