BEDFORD, Ind. — A Bedford mother who compared her dying toddler to serial killer Jeffery Dahmer and called the 18-month-old girl an “a**hole” will spend the next several decades of her life in prison.
Cheyenne Hill, 34, was found guilty of neglect of a dependent resulting in death after a jury trial in February. On Tuesday, she was sentenced to 30 years in prison for the Level 1 felony.
According to a previous report, Hill was arrested in September 2023 after police opened an investigation into the death of her daughter. Her daughter died at Riley Children’s Hospital on Nov. 26, 2022. The young girl had been diagnosed with a brain bleed, a broken collar bone and head and facial bruising.
The girl’s death was later ruled a homicide as the result of blunt force trauma to her head. The toddler was also determined to be malnourished at the time of her death.
Court documents detail how witnesses noticed the facial bruising and swelling on Hill’s daughter in the days leading up to her death. When one witness told Hill that her daughter should be taken to a doctor, Hill reportedly snapped back by telling the witness, “Under no circumstances are you to call an ambulance or take her in (to the hospital) yourself. I will make the decisions. That is my child.”
Hill did end up taking the child to the Bedford hospital, but not until eight days later.
Investigators learned that Hill had a disturbing view of her 18-month-daughter that included comparing the young girl to a serial killer.
In one instance, Hill reportedly told a neighbor that her daughter was going to “kill somebody” one day.
While her daughter was in the hospital, Hill told an Indiana Donor Network Family Service representative that her daughter was “not a nice kid” and that “something wasn’t right with her.”
One of Hill’s co-workers told police that the girl’s mother once blamed the child as being the reason her boyfriend wouldn’t marry her.
According to court documents, investigators spoke to Hill while her daughter was still at the hospital and fighting for her life. Despite the girl being in a serious state, investigators said Hill still left to go to work.
Investigators later asked how Hill could compare her daughter to a serial killer like Jefferey Dahmer in such a time of crisis. Hill reportedly began to laugh and called her dying daughter an “a**hole.”
It wasn’t the first or only time she’d used this term to describe her 18-month-old daughter. Investigators obtained text messages from Hill to her boyfriend where she talked about wanting to throw the child because she wouldn’t stop talking. She once again called the child an “a**hole” in the texts.
Hill’s boyfriend was the one who finally convinced her to take the child to the hospital, according to court documents. Just six days before that, DCS reportedly received an anonymous tip that accused Hill of child abuse and drug use.
