ALBERTVILLE, Ala. (WHNT) – An Albertville woman has pleaded guilty to aggravated child abuse, according to the Marshall County District Attorney’s Office.
The DA’s office said that Carmen Casanova, 33, entered a blind plea of guilty, meaning that the DA did not offer a plea deal and did not have any agreement with Casanova regarding her sentence.
In November 2022, Casanova turned herself in to the Albertville Police Department on abuse charges.
Casanova said that she had left the 2-year-old victim on the third bunk before leaving the room to check on her crying infant. The DA said that Casanova told them she heard a loud noise come from the bedroom.
She told investigators that she assumed the victim fell off the bunk bed, and she was dizzy but up and moving. The DA said that Casanova waited an hour to call 911, until the victim “was blue and not breathing.”
The victim was taken to Children’s of Alabama in Birmingham, where they found her body was covered in bruises and abrasions. Additionally, officials found the victim with a busted lip, bloody nose, a traumatic brain injury normally caused by choking and blunt force, and swelling around the ligaments in her neck.
Doctors performed two life-saving brain surgeries, a blood transfusion and several other medical tests, procedures and therapies, the DA said. According to medical professionals at the UAB Department of Pediatrics Child Abuse Division, the injuries could not have come from falling from the bunk. Instead, the victim had been choked and her injuries were received in a “violent and severe manner.”
The DA’s office added that medical professionals said the victim would have been unresponsive almost immediately after being injured.
The district attorney’s office said they had planned to call a witness about statements that Casanova had made that day. The witness said that, after going to see the victim, Casanova returned to the waiting room and said, “I don’t like her, but I didn’t hit her that hard.”
Additionally, the DA said that they expected the witness to testify that Casanova attempted to kill herself by taking “a lot of pills.” When the witness asked her why she would kill herself if the incident was an accident, Casanova said that she had hit the victim on the head and choked her in the past.
The DA said that they had evidence of Casanova’s motive. In Oct. 2020, after the victim was born, both the victim and Casanova tested positive for opiates, causing the victim and her siblings to be taken into foster care. Casanova was arrested for chemical endangerment of a child.
The victim was in foster care from birth to about four months before this incident took place. Against DHR’s recommendation, in July 2022, the victim and her siblings were returned to Casanova.
Casanova will be sentenced on January 5, 2026. She is facing 10 to 99 years, or life, in state prison.
The post Albertville woman pleads guilty to aggravated child abuse appeared first on WHNT.
