Body of Missing Baby Found, Multiple People Arrested

(ProsperNews.net) – Officers from Kentucky State Police have found a child’s body weeks after her family last saw her. Police located the decomposing infant at the home she shared with her parents in Ohio County and transported the 8-month-old to the Ohio County Coroner’s Officer and then to the Kentucky Medical Examiner Office for examination.

Kentucky State Police declared Miya Tucker Rudd missing in May when a welfare check of her home in Reynold Station found that she was unaccounted for. The welfare visit took place after police arrested the child’s parents for drug possession, and they did not know her whereabouts.

The baby’s mom, Tesla Tucker, and dad, Cage Rudd, were discovered carrying a significant amount of narcotics, including Fentanyl. Both have since been charged with first-degree trafficking in controlled substances, trafficking of illegal drugs, trafficking marijuana, first-degree child abuse, abandonment of a minor engaging in organized crime, and possession of paraphernalia.

Officers also arrested the infant’s grandparents, Ricky J. Smith and Billie J. Smith, and removed her older siblings from the home. Investigators believe that Ricky J. Smith used the residence as a base for a drug-trafficking network and arrested several other family members, including maternal grandparents 50-year-old Taletha D. Tucker and 53-year-old David Tucker.

While entering the Tucker home in Owensboro, police said an associate, Timothy L. Roach, attempted to conceal “unprescribed Suboxone” under his vehicle. He was also arrested. A second associate, 28-year-old Brodie Payne, who lived at the Rudd home, was likewise taken into custody and charged with a number of drug offenses.

Miya’s parents, together with Ricky Smith, appeared in an Ohio County courtroom on June 17. New charges were added to their tally, including the abuse of a corpse, failure to report the death of a person, and tampering with evidence.

Detective Dalton Mellott of Kentucky State Police testified that he found a bag of meth in a child’s bedroom that was “laying on the floor, in plain view.”