Hampton, Virginia: Tuesday, December 14, 37-year-old Julia L. Tomlin appeared before Hampton Circuit Court Judge Michael Gaten and pleaded guilty to one count each of second-degree murder, felony child neglect, and concealing of a dead body.
There was no plea agreement according to WAVY.
In 2019 2-year-old Noah Tomlin was reported missing and for a week, there was a multi-agency search for the young boy. His body was eventually recovered from inside of a Huggies box the Hampton Steam Plant.
After the autopsy results came back, Hampton Commonwealth Attorney General Anton Bell did not mince words when he announced that "This child was tortured." He explained further stating, "His abuse was of such a nature that his bones stopped growing. There is evidence of that."
Noah was found to have died from blunt force trauma, suffering from several skull fractures and battered child syndrome. Prosecutors would not go into specifics, but rather stated the severity of Noah's injuries were "as if a child had fallen several stories."
Tomlin is scheduled to be sentenced on March 18, 2022. She faces a possible sentence of 55 years in prison.
Tomlin's sister-in-law, Theresa Tomlin, however, spoke to the media on her behalf. Theresa stated that she believes in her innocence and blames Tomlin's ex-boyfriend for the boy's death, though asserted that it was likely all an accident. She explained that she had witnessed Noah banging his own head against the crib allegedly because he had autism.
Tomlin, a mother of ten, had lost custody of her other nine children.