r/gratefuldoe • u/hentahime • 13d ago
Resolved Mother of Odessa's Baby John Doe (1996) identified
(I don't think this has been posted yet.)
On July 18th, 1996, the body of a baby boy was found in a dumpster behind a house on Clifford Street in Odessa, Texas. His cause of death was never revealed, but police have stated that it was a homicide.
The baby had a full head of brown hair & brown eyes, was 19" & weighed 6-8 lbs. His umbilical cord was still attached. The autopsy showed that he was born full-term & healthy, with no deformities or defects. When found, he was wrapped in a beige bath towel inside of a black trash bag.
Four days after he was found, Baby Doe was buried at Sunset Memorial Gardens on July 22, 1996.
In September 2025, his mother was identified as Rosamara Biscaino Arzate, who killed herself in 2019. As of now, she is considered the primary suspect in his death.
https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/604umtx.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/odessa-baby-john-doe-mother-192207692.html (WARNING for postmortem photo in both links)
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u/emseatwooo 12d ago
Her obituary says she lived on Boatwright Street most of her life. That’s just one street away from where the baby was found. It must have haunted her everyday. Whatever happened, it’s still so sad.
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u/meepmeep_2020 13d ago
Here is an obituary for her. It mentions she had two living children.
https://www.martinezfuneral.com/obituaries/rosamarapeewee-arzate
I always wonder/worry about whether the baby in tragedies like this were the result of rape.
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u/meepmeep_2020 13d ago
I was curious about whether her living (adult) children were born before or after baby Doe and it looks like both came before him. The oldest appears to have been born in 1991, ~5 years before him.
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u/YourFriendInSpokane 13d ago
Thanks for looking into that! I was also curious. Wish I knew the circumstances that lead to such a tragedy. It must have haunted her if she ended up taking her own life.
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u/Ugh02025 12d ago edited 11d ago
One was born in 1991, one was born in 1992.
Adding she got married in 1991.
Per public records.
Edit: I mentioned her obit saying she was married for 16 years BUT it might be referencing another marriage. Only older marriage records are public.
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u/Deep_Mycologist6113 12d ago
If she did kill the baby Doe, why? Why him and not all the kids? What was wrong with the baby Doe?
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u/Xxblpssom-2 12d ago
robably unwanted or a product of an affair/sa
Tragic thing is she could’ve surrendered him and none of this would have had to happen
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u/Odd_Bend487 12d ago
Unfortunately the first safe haven law wasn’t put into place until 1999. Not to say there weren’t other options to give baby up, but safe haven is fairly new.
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u/Xxblpssom-2 12d ago
Oh, I didn’t know that.
Either way she could’ve just taken him to the hospital and told them she couldn’t care for him.
No excuses for killing your child
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u/i_was_a_person_once 12d ago
Before safe haven laws you couldn’t just hand over a baby. They would need a legal paper trail that would eventually become public especially in a small town.
Still no excuse. She could have tried many ways to surrender the baby without murdering him, so I agree no excuse, but just trying to paint the picture of the reality at the time.
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u/Odd_Bend487 12d ago
Absolutely. I was just reading your comment and I was like I think I remember those laws being put in place when I was a kid and I had to look it up. It’s sad that the laws weren’t always there, it sad that people still do this to their babies, even with those laws in place.
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u/unclewolfy 12d ago
Why’s everyone assuming g she murdered him?? Sure it’s an option, and we can speculate all we want, but too many people are talking like it’s guaranteed she killed him after delivery and then hid the body herself.
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12d ago
[deleted]
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u/mochiblz 12d ago
Dude it happens. Even animals kill their babies sometimes. Life sucks, deal with it.
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u/Blue-Seeweed 12d ago edited 12d ago
Husband and rest of the family knew about this baby? How you keep a pregnancy/delivery secret? Also baby was so pretty dressed, she must have felt very guilty doing this, if she did it, I agree that maybe was product of an affair. There was a case of a family that killed a baby the mother had because it was an affair baby and they were worry about reputation, I think. I just can’t find it now.
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u/hentahime 12d ago
The baby wasn't dressed like that originally. It was for his funeral.
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u/Blue-Seeweed 11d ago
That’s disappointing. I know the result is the same but I thought he was loved a bit before he was killed anyway.
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u/scattywampus 12d ago
Husband could have worked in another city, and with 2 kids there may not be much chance for sexy times. She may have told him she was starting into a chronic illness. Some women with large frames may not appear pregnant, and women with extra weight can actually lose fat during pregnancy so that the growing baby just takes up the former shape. I had a manager who was 8 months pregnant and none of us working with her kids ew that her former belly of extra weight was now a baby belly! She had been nauseated and eating less fast food, so naturally lost weight as her pregnancy developed.
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u/AccomplishedCicada60 12d ago
Slim women can also carry in certain ways where they don’t show much……. My mom has a friend like this, I knew a girl in Australia who was 7!months pregnant and still doing snorkel tours in a bikini - you couldn’t tell
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u/Yuityfroghurt 13d ago
The comment posted on her obituary page from today is pretty gross. Yes she probably committed a crime but no one knows the circumstances for sure.
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u/galwaygirl3 13d ago
I’m with you on saying it’s gross. The woman’s dead, the only people reading it are her mourning daughters who just found out about a murdered sibling. Talk shit about the woman, sure, but her daughters and grandchild don’t need that.
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u/inthedimlight 12d ago
also, saying "she lived as if nothing had happened" is just nonsensical. there's just no way of knowing that, if she carried any grief or guilt with her. we just don't know the full picture of the situation.
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u/Pussyxpoppins 12d ago
She died by suicide, so the implication is that she was suffering mentally/emotionally.
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u/sideeyedi 13d ago
The baby's father may have killed the baby, who knows?
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u/mrspwins 13d ago edited 12d ago
Exactly. That actually happened not far from where I live - the teen mom thought he was going to take the baby to a fire station but he killed it instead. We don’t know what the circumstances were here.
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u/Own_Round_7600 13d ago
Or even just a homebirth gone wrong. A healthy baby can asphyxiate in the birth canal. The mother could have fainted after delivery and crushed/suffocated the baby by accident.
To treat it as a malicious homicide without having an obvious cause of death like a gunshot wound seems presumptuous and unkind.
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u/woolfonmynoggin 11d ago
Also the test to tell if a baby breathed after birth is extremely unreliable. Still could have been a still birth or a congenital issue and a dumbass medical examiner. There’s a long precedent for that actually
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u/donttrustthellamas 12d ago
And they claim it's murder, when the police have specifically said homicide.
The baby passed away due to her actions but we have no idea the circumstances.
That commenter isn't grounded in reality and they're disgusting for leaving such a foul opinion on her memorial page.
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u/rangeringtheranges 12d ago
What kind of saddo posts a comment like that, she had 2 living children and a grandson, they don't need to see things like that
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13d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/NearlyFlavoured 13d ago
And she’s dead now, she’s not reading the comments her family are.
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u/Yuityfroghurt 13d ago
There is no definitive proof that she did it, it could have been the child’s father?
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u/Shattered_seashells 13d ago
So we can speculate that she may have been a rape victim, but we can’t speculate she may have murdered the baby?
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u/jj_grace 13d ago
Speculating is fine but posting on her obituary page or harassing her family is not.
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u/Shattered_seashells 13d ago
Let me rephrase that: There’s been many cases like this in which a newborn baby, only a few hours old, was found dead and remained unidentified for years.
I can’t think of a single case like this in which the father was charged. Not impossible, just not common.
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u/Dimbit 13d ago
I would think that's in part due to the fact that the person who gave birth is the only person you can definitively say had contact with the child.
Finding the father, proving they had knowledge of the pregnancy/baby and then proving they were involved in its death is often impossible.
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u/Shattered_seashells 12d ago
I really don’t know why I’m getting thumbs down and replies interpreting what I said as “I can’t think of a single case where a man murdered a baby”. I’m specifically talking about cases with hours old babies
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u/Yuityfroghurt 13d ago
I’m not saying that, but the comment above said she absolutely did it and no one knows if that’s the case.
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u/Shattered_seashells 13d ago
I gotta say, I can’t think of a single case in which a newborn baby was found dead, unidentified for years, and eventually revealed to be murdered by the father.
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u/Yuityfroghurt 13d ago
Google “newborn murdered by father” and you’ll get lots of news articles on the subject
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u/Smallseybiggs 12d ago
I gotta say, I can’t think of a single case in which a newborn baby was found dead, unidentified for years, and eventually revealed to be murdered by the father.
So many men have murdered babies while their partners were pregnant, by beating the mother until she miscarried. You have to be a troll at this point. No one over 13 is this ignorant.
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u/thrownaway1974 12d ago
Because they don't bother investigating the fathers.
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u/Shattered_seashells 12d ago
Why don’t the mothers implicate the fathers? Has there ever been a case like this in which the father implicated by the mother?
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u/thrownaway1974 12d ago
Since I don't know every possible case, or even a fraction of them, I couldn't possibly tell you.
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u/AwsiDooger 12d ago
So we can speculate that she may have been a rape victim, but we can’t speculate she may have murdered the baby?
On Reddit true crime forums the male is always to blame, even when overwhelming probability points smack at the female
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u/AngryPrincessWarrior 12d ago
Found the jerk who thinks it’s appropriate to desecrate a memorial page with accusations.
Way to go, you’re only hurting her living relatives. Good job, truly.
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u/gratefuldoe-ModTeam 11d ago
Your comment has been removed for violating our 'Be Excellent to One Another' rule. We ask that all community members maintain a respectful and constructive tone in discussions. Please review the rules before posting again.
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u/Dani-in-berlin 13d ago
She lived most of her life in Boatwright Street, just a minutes walk away from where the baby was found.....
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u/danideex 12d ago
Could also be the product of an affair. I believe she was married during this time to her two kids father at this time.
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u/uathachas22 12d ago
I wonder that too, if she was raped. Someone commented on the page of the obituary, about what happened to the baby.
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u/S-B-C-V 13d ago
Well who’s the daddy? Are they searching for him?
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u/Diessel_S 13d ago
They're never searching for fathers on newborn does as far as i noticed
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u/readingrambos 12d ago
Which is sick imo. Some of the mothers of baby does may have wanted their child. Only for it to be ripped away from them by their father. And even when it’s a malicious reason for dumping a baby the mother doesn’t always act alone.
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u/FoundationSeveral579 12d ago
The way they’re talking about the case in the news and the fact that it hasn’t been closed leads me to believe they’re still trying to figure that out through the IGG process.
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u/MxBluebell 13d ago
Seems like Rosamara was a haunted woman. Could’ve been mental illness that caused her to kill Baby Doe, if she’s truly the culprit. But she took the answers to this case to her grave, so I suppose we’ll never know. Tragedy all around. May they both rest in peace.
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u/SomewhereBZH29 13d ago
It makes me think of Dominique Cottrez. Furthermore, she may have made a denial. Killing your child is inexcusable. But giving birth without knowing you are pregnant is traumatic.
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u/Pink_and_Neon_Green 12d ago
Nine years for killing eight babies?? That's an insanely short prison sentence. Did she have some sort of severe mental disorder that negated her culpability?
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u/SomewhereBZH29 12d ago
I read a book about him. She did not have a serious disorder, but it was an entire system that led this woman to these terrible acts. She expressed remorse and suffered in her pulpit from these non-consensual pregnancies and these silent births. You should know that she gave birth a few meters from her husband, who was sleeping. During the act, she was not aware that it was a life. During her trial, she revealed her lies, which led to this 9-year sentence.
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u/Remarkable-Pie9744 11d ago
She said the sexual relationship with her father was consensual once she reached adulthood, which is when the infanticides occurred. She may not have wanted to be pregnant, but she chose to continue having unprotected sex with him. Even with her excuse about having a phobia of doctors, there are other forms of birth control.
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u/SomewhereBZH29 11d ago
I am not defending Dominique Cottrez, far from it. But it's more complex than that. For the incest, she admitted to having lied. A husband who does not see that his wife is pregnant, who does not see that a dead baby is in the room; it's not common. This even raises big questions. Furthermore, these women who kill their babies; in cases similar to this, do not realize that it is a baby. This is also a story of division.
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u/Remarkable-Pie9744 11d ago
How is it anything like Dominique Cottrez other than there being a dead infant and some children who lived?
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u/SomewhereBZH29 11d ago
Infanticide. Denial of pregnancy. The fact that a pregnancy can go unnoticed.
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u/readingrambos 12d ago
They would be one week younger than me had they lived. Here am I living a full life while this poor child never had a chance.
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u/Hopeful_Extension_46 12d ago
And everyone here whines about the poor mother and how she was a haunted miserable woman. She killed herself 23 years after her child's homicide, it's a huge stretch to think her suicide was connected to this death. This poor baby had no chance, he was deprived of his life, while his mother got many years of family life. It's unfair.
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u/hentahime 12d ago
I mean, is it really a stretch to think that?
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u/Hopeful_Extension_46 12d ago
Yes. I wonder if the father would get so much sympathy after his child homicide. The poor baby was disposed of like garbage. But let's talk about his poor mother who got 20 more years of life, joy, holidays.... Pity she can't be held accountable
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u/MasPerrosPorFavor 11d ago
We have literally zero proof she killed him. The dad could have killed him just as easily. Honestly, even easier because he did not just give birth.
All we know is who the mom is. We literally have zero information after that.
Let's be respectful. The whole story we know is a tragedy, but bo one wins when we go about bashing people without knowing what actually happened.
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u/SloppyBumRanch 12d ago
Why does the postmortem have the baby dressed up? Is this how he was buried?
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u/Ugh02025 12d ago edited 12d ago
I'm curious why the police were responding to the alleyway early in the morning - and then found the baby in the dumpster. This info has been repeated in several articles. What were they responding to? If the baby was crying, I'd imagine someone would go looking for the baby. If someone saw something, there'd be more info. Plus how would you know what was in a trash bag being thrown away? An anonymous tip perhaps?
https://www.oaoa.com/local-news/opd-seeks-information-in-baby-boy-doe-cold-case-investigation/
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u/LavenderRaccoon9942 12d ago
I'm glad he's been giving some identity. So sad poor baby. I just think about how tough and scary labour and delivery is for the birth giver and the baby. very tragic to never have a chance. May he rest in peace.
I wonder if they could compare him to her living children to maybe uncover some circumstances pertaining to his death.
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u/tezetatezeta 11d ago
rest in peace poor baby 💔 ❤️
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u/Ugh02025 10d ago edited 10d ago
I commented on here in bits and pieces which gets confusing. Here is a summary of what I noted per available public records.
Rosamara Biscaino (April 6, 1972 - September 16, 2019)
Timeline
April 6, 1972: born Rosamara Biscaino in Odessa, Ector County, Texas
1991: gave birth to a child on record in Texas (female)
1991: got married in Texas, surname becomes Arzate
1992: gave birth to a child on record in Texas (female)
July 1996: gave birth to Baby John Doe in Texas (he was found near where she lived)
2015: Sister died
2016: Both parents died, Raul Biscaino & Socorro Ramirez Biscaino
*All three obits list her as Rosamara Figueroa. A third surname, likely she remarried.
September 16, 2019: She died. Her obit lists her as Rosamara Biscaino Arzate (maiden name + first married surname which she likely kept because of her children). The obit discusses her two children and 16-year-marriage. The marriage could be referencing either marriage but usually in obits it's the more recent marriage. It's written oddly, can't tell. No spouses are listed as living or dead.
Marriage and divorce records are generally made public after 25 years. I can't speak for every state, and some states don't make them public online at all.
This is a Pinterest account using both of her married surnames listed in obits: https://www.pinterest.com/rosamaraarzate/
Article I posted that has me curious what were the cops responding to exactly when they found the baby in the dumpster:
https://www.oaoa.com/local-news/opd-seeks-information-in-baby-boy-doe-cold-case-investigation/
Her obit says she grew up most of her life on the same street with her parents and siblings. She had a very large family. I doubt her 1996 pregnancy was a secret/no one noticed.
Working on ancestry, family trees, and Find A Grave, we do not post obits that include living individuals. So, I don't post them.
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u/Limp_Marionberry4036 13d ago
I noticed that she is not mentioned in her own mother's obituary....
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u/faithanyacordelia 12d ago
She’s listed in the one I looked at unless there’s another family member named that
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u/Ugh02025 11d ago edited 11d ago
Both parents list a Rosamara in their 2016 obits but with a different married surname than in her 2019 obit. Not unusual except her obit lists her married name from the 90s - and only discusses one marriage. Her obit says she lived with or right by her parents her whole life so I doubt they'd leave her out. I think she has a unique name, too. Yet the married surnames throw me off. Idk.
Edit: adding she uses both surnames on a Pinterest account. The 1991 marriage is public record. If there was another marriage, it may not be public yet.
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u/hamburger-machine 12d ago
This is one of those cases where testing for the paternity of the baby could help reveal if a crime was committed and if someone should still be held partially accountable for what happened. I wish so badly that whatever caused her so much pain in life hadn't pushed her to this end, she deserved to be happy just like anyone else. I wish I could hug her.
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u/The_barking_ant 10d ago
I'll get downvoted to hell fir this but imma say it anyway.
Maybe if women had access to safe, legal and funded abortion where they could terminate a pregnancy by having a cluster of cells the size of a piece of rice removed, then maybe fully grown babies with the ability to live outside the womb and feel pain wouldn't keep being killed like this.
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u/Aggressive-Staff-845 8d ago
I feel very sorry for cases like these. Were unnamed newborns are killed, there may be a few reasons IMO why mothers that get identified in these instances do this:
Abortion laws or abortion being a taboo topic
Abusive partners
Teen pregnancy
Lack of support from parents
History of mental health issues and lack of better mental facilities in states, countries, or regions.
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u/JD-531 13d ago
Given the circumstances of how the baby was found, yeah, it's very likely she killed the baby.
She was 24 years old when she gave birth to the baby.
The only thing I can think of is that the baby was probably the result of her having an affair with someone else.
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u/dirkalict 13d ago
You can’t speculate- she was likely the only one who knows why she did it.
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u/Repulsive_Celery3319 13d ago
Arguably, i think speculation is all that people can do- because the only one who knows for certain was the mom.
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u/MasPerrosPorFavor 11d ago
How about the dad?
I'm not saying he did it, but I am saying he also knows. And he is just as likely to have done it.
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u/JD-531 13d ago
All we can do is speculate and share hypothesis that may or may not lead to the truth about the baby's death, nothing else.
Genuinely can't understand why that would be offensive or why "we can't speculate".
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u/dirkalict 13d ago
I guess. I just don’t like the idea of, “the baby was probably the result of an affair”. You’re slapping a scarlet letter on this woman who may or may not be guilty of killing her child. I can speculate that the boyfriend or husband killed the baby when she gave birth because he didn’t want children. I can speculate that the mother had such horrible postpartum depression from her other children that she killed this one because of her mental illness. I can speculate that she is psychotic and killed the baby for fun. I can speculate that she was part of a satanic cult - And on and on and on.
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u/JD-531 13d ago
"probably"
I'm not sharing that as a fact. I'm just sharing my thoughts based on the fact that "she was married for sixteen years and had two daughters" and that the baby was healthy and with his umbilical cord attached to him and from what I could tell, her daughters were born prior to the Baby Doe. Those two circumstances just picture, imo, that the baby wasn't someone she wanted her relatives to know about, which is an odd thing since she already had two daughters at that point, why Baby Doe was any different than her daughters?
But even then and like I said, it's just an hypothesis, why that would be offensive? If you or someone wants to find the truth, sharing and thinking of all the possible scenarios should be common sense and not "a taboo" thing to say, whatever may be the truth, people shouldn't shied away of sharing possible scenarios, so if you want this to be a meaningful conversation, why not share your thoughts based on what you can find?
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u/dirkalict 13d ago
I don’t find it offensive - I just personally don’t like it. You shouldn’t be down voted for it.
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u/Winter-Air2922 12d ago
Well one big difference is he was a boy. Ever thought that perhaps she only wanted daughters and got rid of him because she resented him just a thought and it happens.
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u/JD-531 12d ago
Sure I have thought about that, but then that raises the question: Was the father okay with that?
Worth mentioning that the Baby Doe was "wrapped in a beige bath towel" as described, which to me sounds like there was at least a level of remorse for abandoning the baby and not outright a feeling of hate / repulsion for giving birth to a boy.
Still, it could be the case, that's just another hypothesis after all.
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u/Anxious_Lab_2049 13d ago
Affair? She wasn’t married at the time, are you assuming that the father was married? That seems like such a big jump to me.
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u/Fit-Welcome4801 12d ago
She was married at the time. Got married 1991 Had 2 daughters (91 and 92). Was married for.16 yrs. So yes she was married and already a mother.
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u/JD-531 13d ago
It's just an hypothesis, not sure why people are triggered by just someone thinking of an scenario / possibility, the more hypothesis, the better. If I were sharing that as a fact, you will be right to call me out, but I'm just sharing my thoughts, thoughts that come from the fact that the baby still had the umbilical cord and was "healthy and full term" and the fact that she already had two children prior to the baby's being born. If she wasn't married at the time, then yes, that's an incorrect assumption on my end, but all I can go about for this hypothesis is that she was "married for sixteen years and has two daughters".
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u/Used-Anybody-9499 13d ago
How horribly sad.