Unsettling photos captured on a baby monitor purportedly depict a 13-year-old student in Florida, USA, skulking above his mother’s bed just before he allegedly stabbed her with a knife as his younger sister slept in a baby crib a short distance away.
The Miami-Dade District Attorney’s Office released time-stamped black-and-white images on Monday that depict Derek Rosa watching his mother Irina Garcia as she slept on October 12, 2023.
Rosa can be seen watching Garcia just after eleven that evening. After 30 minutes or so, he made a 911 call to report her murder.
Another image shows Rosa sticking his tongue out and making a sign with his hand, which appears to have bloodstains on it, in a selfie allegedly sent to a friend following the murder.
The District Attorney’s office also shared an image of a pink-handled knife with what looks to be blood on it.
The chilling twist, the teen’s newborn half-sister sleeps in a crib right next to the bed while the mom sleeps, seemingly unaware of her son’s presence or intentions .
Prosecutors have yet to provide further detail on what they claim happened in the photo.
Even more disturbing, another still-framed shot shows Garcia in her bed, with the lights on, cradling her 14-day-old baby at 10:23 the same evening.
Within an hour of the image’s time stamp, Garcia, 39, would allegedly be killed by her son.
During an 18-minute call with the 911 operator on the night of the murder, Rosa had confessed to murdering his mother and sending a picture of the action to a friend, telling the dispatcher, “There’s blood all over the floor.”
The eighth-grade honor student also allegedly said, “I have the gun with me. I was going to shoot myself, but I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to. There’s a knife in my room, and there’s a gun in the living room.”
His half-sister was unharmed.
Rosa’s stepfather also lived in the apartment but was out of town for work at the time of the killing.
The teen pleaded not guilty to his mother’s murder last month November and will stand trial as an adult.
His lawyers want him to be moved to a juvenile detention facility instead of being behind bars at Metro West Detention Center, an adult jail.
On Friday, Judge Richard Hersch heard arguments over whether Rosa should be transferred to the juvenile detention center and wait for trial, NBC News reported.
The decision on his transfer was pushed back to allow the defense more time to make its argument.
Rosa is currently the youngest of 34 juveniles being held at the new juvenile section at Metro West, according to NBC News.
Prosecutors remain adamant that the teen should not be transferred to a juvenile facility.
