Overview
- Trottier appeared in Barnes County court Monday as prosecutors filed a Class AA felony murder charge and a judge set her bond at $750,000.
- Investigators exhumed the infant’s remains in 2019 and used genetic genealogy, which compares DNA to find biological relatives, to identify Trottier by 2020.
- Testing reported in June 2023 found it was 3.481 quadrillion times more likely the baby was the child of Trottier and her husband than an unrelated person.
- DNA consistent with Trottier was also detected on tissue paper recovered at the scene, and during a 2021 interview she told investigators, “Maybe it was me,” before giving a DNA sample.
- A preliminary hearing and arraignment are scheduled for May 21, and residents who long visited Rebecca’s gravesite say the charge brings long-awaited closure to Valley City.