Tuesday, June 18, 2019

AUGUSTA, GA (WRDW/WAGT) -- Richmond County deputies are still searching for a baby after bond was denied for a woman on Monday who originally said she miscarried before she changed her story.

According to District Attorney Natalie Paine's office, Tabitha Moss, 32, remains in jail Tuesday due to being a "danger to the community." She's been charged with lying to investigators.

But deputies are still trying to piece together where the woman's infant child is and if it's still alive.

Investigators said University Hospital reported Moss' child was missing last Wednesday after she came to the hospital bleeding.

Doctors, investigators said, figured out she had just given birth, but she denied being pregnant at first.

According to the incident report, deputies asked Moss her side of the story and she told them she took a pregnancy test in January that came back positive.

"She said she 'had no interest in this pregnancy' and got drunk on her birthday," the report said.

Moss also told deputies that she visited several clinics and they told her it was too late to have an abortion because she was 3 months pregnant.

Instead, the report said, Moss gave no prenatal care to the fetus and knew that "spotting" was an indication of the potential for a spontaneous abortion or miscarriage.

"She stated she wanted that to occur," the report said. "She stated, other than abortion clinics, she never went to see a doctor."

First, deputies say she told them she gave birth to a "stillborn" which was "buried in a yard."

Next they say she told them she was "riding in her roommate's truck” when she started cramping. She told them she "passed the baby" into a "grocery bag."

Then they say she said the baby was buried but later changed it to flushed down a toilet.

Deputies searched several areas they said Moss told them where the newborn might be but came up with nothing.

Paine's office, meanwhile, says Moss told her boyfriend that she was pregnant and due on June 13. But, according to the incident report, Moss told deputies she made up the whole story to "keep" her boyfriend and that the miscarriage was faked.

But one of Moss' neighbors disagrees. The neighbor said she was definitely pregnant.

"When she moved here last fall she was pregnant," the neighbor said. "I just seen her a couple days before this incident happened and she was very pregnant."

One consistency in this case, investigators said, was that Moss continued to change her story several times.

Moss' two other children, meanwhile, are in the custody of DFACS.

Several weeks ago, Forsyth County deputies found a baby in a grocery bag. The little girl is alive and investigators there are still searching for the mother. Deputies here, meanwhile, say they're looking into a possible connection.

More charges could be coming for Moss.

So far, investigators have found no trace of the missing infant.