Brandon D. Thoma and Taylor K. Blaha (Webster County Sheriff’s Office)
A 31-year-old father in Iowa will spend several decades behind bars after admitting to his role in killing his newborn daughter by instructing and coaching his girlfriend on how to drown the child in the bathtub immediately after she was born to prevent police from finding meth in her system.
Webster County Circuit Court Judge Kurt J. Stoebe on Friday ordered Brandon D. Thoma to serve a sentence of 20 to 50 years in a state correctional facility for the cold-blooded slaying of young Kayleen Lee Blaha, court records reviewed by Law&Crime show.
Thoma in July reached a deal with prosecutors in which he agreed to plead guilty to one count of child endangerment resulting in death and one count of abuse of a corpse. In exchange for his plea, prosecutors dropped one count of first-degree murder Thoma had initially been facing.
Kayleen’s mother, Taylor K. Blaha, who had also been facing a first-degree murder charge, earlier this month pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree murder in her daughter’s death. She was similarly sentenced to 35 to 50 years in prison during a hearing last week.
The couple also have a son together who was 2 years old at the time of Kayleen’s death.
Taylor Blaha’s father read a victim impact statement during Friday’s hearing in which he spoke directly to Thoma about the horrors his abuse has had on his daughter and grandchildren.
“My daughter was in this courtroom a week ago and when she was sentenced she had a big smile on her face,” he said in footage provided by Des Moines CBS affiliate KCCI. “I asked her, ‘Why were you smiling — you were just convicted and sentenced to 50 years.’ You know what she said? She said, ‘I’ll be in prison, Dad, and he can’t hurt me no more.’”
During her sentencing hearing last week, Blaha told the court that Thoma “convinced” her that if authorities found out about her meth use, they would take her son away from her.
“He convinced me that the only way out of this was to drown the baby in the bathtub,” she said. “He told me what to do and how to do it. When I tried to take my hands off her, he would put my hands back on her and encourage me to keep going. She died as a result.”
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According to a probable cause affidavit obtained by Law&Crime, Blaha on Nov. 22, 2022, went to Unity Point Trinity Regional Medical Center where she met with an employee at the Iowa Department of Human Services (DHS). Blaha allegedly said that she “gave birth to a baby at her residence and that it had been buried at an undisclosed location.”
The IDHS employee contacted the Webster County Law Enforcement Center and a detective with the sheriff’s office responded to the scene.
In an interview with the detective, Blaha said she found out she was pregnant with Thoma’s child in April 2022. The two already have a 2-year-old son together. She explained that she gave birth to a baby girl in the bathroom of their apartment located in the 900 block of Central Avenue in Fort Dodge on Nov. 16.
“She stated that Thoma was in the bedroom of the apartment when she gave birth but that once the baby was born, he came into the bathroom and helped her get from where she was sitting on the toilet to a position sitting inside the bathtub with the baby,” the affidavit states. “She advises the two named the baby Kayleen Lee Blaha and that she was born alive, crying, moving its arms and legs, and opening her eyes allowing Blaha to see that Kayleen had brown eyes.”
Blaha allegedly said she asked Thoma for methamphetamine to help assuage the pain from giving birth and he provided her with the drugs. She told the detective they had “no intentions” of keeping the child and planned to let Blaha’s sister adopt the girl. She added that Thoma severed the umbilical cord with a pair of scissors and cut “sections of the cord to be kept to remember the baby.”
However, Blaha told authorities that she and Thoma soon became nervous their neighbors would hear Kayleen crying and alert law enforcement. They were scared that if law enforcement came to the home and found methamphetamine in the baby’s system they would lose custody of their 2-year-old son.
“Blaha went on to explain that in order to stop the crying the two placed Kayleen in the bathtub, which was about half full of water, and placed both of their hands on the baby’s chest, forcing her underwater, ultimately killing her,” the affidavit states. “Blaha also explained that Thoma demonstrated to her how to do this. Blaha advised that once the baby was held under water, Thoma removed the baby from the bathtub and sat her outside of the tub before ultimately placing her in a plastic storage container, wrapping her in multiple layers of trash bags, and then placing her inside of a black backpack that he carried her out of the apartment in.”
While Kayleen’s body was never recovered, investigators executed a search warrant on their apartment and recovered what appeared to be the portion of the umbilical cord that Thoma had as a keepsake to “remember” their daughter.
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