The Alexander City Outlook

An Alexander City woman has been indicted with felony charges related to the death of a 3-month-old baby.

Lindsey Nelson, 24, has been charged with chemical endangerment of exposing a child to an environment in which controlled substances are produced or distributed.

According to Lt. Jay Turner of the Alexander City Police Department, an officer was dispatched to a residence on Second

Nelson

Street in May 2012 “in reference to an unresponsive child.” The child was transported to the hospital and pronounced dead.

Turner said it is standard protocol for an autopsy to be conducted to determine cause of death in such cases, and the autopsy results were the cause of Nelson’s indictment.

“Once the autopsy came back, it explained the cause of death of the child,” Turner said. “At that point, it was presented to the grand jury, and this was the indictment that came out.”

Because the case will not go to trial until April, Turner said ACPD would not release specifics about the controlled substance to which the child had been exposed.

Turner said Nelson has been charged with subsections 1 and 3 of Alabama Code, Section 26-15-3.2.

“She was charged with subsection 1, which states that someone ‘knowingly, recklessly or intentionally causes or permits a child to be exposed to, to ingest or inhale, or to have contact with a controlled substance, chemical substance or drug paraphernalia,’” Turner said. “Subsection 3 basically says if you violate subsection 1 and it results in the death of that child, it bumps it up to a Class A felony.”

Nelson is currently under a $100,000 bond and will be transported to the Tallapoosa County Jail by Tuesday.