Alexandra Nicole Laird.jpg

Alexandra Nicole Laird

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A young Pleasant Grove mother indicted earlier this year after her newborn baby girl was born addicted to heroin is pregnant again and back behind bars on another child endangerment charge.

Police today obtained a formal warrant against Alexandra Nicole Laird, 21, and a Jefferson County judge ordered her jailed without bond until the baby's birth. She is estimated to be between 18 to 20 weeks pregnant.

"I'm doing my damndest to try to prevent any further damage to this child, since it's obvious the mother doesn't seem to care,'' said Pleasant Grove police Lt. Danny Reid.

A Jefferson County grand jury on April 15 indicted Laird on the first charge. She was initially arrested May 1, 2015 and had remained free on bond since then. Laird on March 29, 2015 gave birth to a baby girl at UAB Medical West, court records show. Routine newborn testing performed on the day the baby was born turned up positive for opiates and amphetamines, both controlled substances. The baby on April 6, 2015 was transferred to Princeton Baptist Medical Center where she received treatment for the withdrawals.

In that case, Reid said Laird later admitted to detectives that she used heroin one to two times a week for at least five months of her pregnancy. Because of the severity of the baby's illness, Reid sought, and received, an enhanced charge of chemical endangerment of a child against Laird, which is a Class B felony.

Laird does not have custody of her daughter. "You won't know you've truly victimized this child until much later in life when she has trouble in school, trouble functioning,'' Reid said at the time of Laird's indictment.

She also faces an unrelated drug possession charge after she was arrested again less than two months after her daughter's birth. In that case, she and a man were pulled over during a traffic stop in Tarrant, records show. The man she was with was arrested on an outstanding warrant. A search of the vehicle turned up 38 hydrocodone pills. Neither Laird nor the man claimed ownership of those pills.

In late August, Laird was arrested again for failure to appear in court. A condition of her previous child endangerment charge required her to not commit any other crimes while out on bond, which Reid said she did when she failed to show up for a court hearing. She then went before a judge who revoked her bond and administered a court-ordered drug test, which was positive.

She was remanded to jail in the Bessemer Cutoff on Sept. 8. It was then she admitted to using heroin three times a day, Reid said, and admitted to being pregnant which authorities confirmed with a pregnancy test.

Reid went before Jefferson County Circuit Judge David Hobdy today and argued for no bond, claiming that the unborn baby's life is in danger of continued heroin exposure.

"This is a sad case, no matter how you look at it, as the mother's heroin addiction is more compelling to her than the health and welfare of this unborn child,'' Reid said. "But make no mistake, sad or not, law enforcement will hold this mother accountable and vigorously defend and protect the well being of the child, who is innocent of all of this and simply struggling for life."

Bessemer Cutoff District Attorney Bill Veitch agreed. "The whole thing is just sad,'' Veitch said. "Very sad."