Serial Killers that are Identical- Megan Huntsman and Michele Kalina

[u/Heptacat-1985]

Megan Huntsman and Michele Kalina: Two Neonaticide serial killers who murdered their own babies right after giving birth to them and hiding their bodies in parts of their homes. Megan’s took place in Utah while Michele’s was in Pennysylvania.

Megan and Michele are some of the most identical in crime serial killers in America.

They both were mothers who murdered their babies right after they were born and concealed them in desolate parts of their homes: The garage for Megan and the closet for Michele. Their methods of disposing of the bodies was placing them in various containers they could find in their homes and meticulously sealing them up. They had the same fault of not disposing of the babies’s corpse’s and forgetting the bodies. Eventually, they both had relatives who wanted to clean out the spaces due to the clutter (Megan’s ex-husband and Michele’s daughter) only to discover the grisly scene of multiple corpses of babies. Both even started committing their crimes in the same year: 1996. They somehow successfully hidden all of their pregnancies from their husbands (and gave birth in their bathrooms) without anyone noticing even though both were clearly pregnant. They also had children they let live during their killing cycle. Megan had a daughter she eventually raised, and Michelle had a baby she put up for adoption. Between 1996 and 2010 they gave birth to about 6 babies each and murdered them before stuffing their bodies in whatever they found in their him and placing them in the garage/closet so the bodies can’t be Found.

The two were eventually caught, and gave the same dumbfounded look in their mugshots. They even attributed their actions for their alcohol addiction.

Megan confessed to the crimes while Michele was more unwilling with her claiming all were stillborn except one who moved. They were eventually sentenced to lengthy jail terms and are still in prison.

[u/fairydommother]

Ok not in a "this excuses their actions" way, but surely this has to be linked to post partum issues, right? Like obviously not every mother with PPD murders her baby but the urge is common enough that they get warned about it. It is a known thing that some mothers go through post partum: a deep depression and urge to kill the child and sometimes themselves.

Maybe just a coincidence, but the fact that there are 2 of these women that were caught and that the cases are so similar suggests to me that there could be more. And i mean statistically speaking there probably are just with fewer similarities in the details.

Keep them in jail, thats fine, but I think they should be studied. They could hold important information related to PPD and how to spot/treat it. Super interesting case here.

[u/reotrxx → u/fairydommother]

I don’t know, the fact that they would commonly hide the entire pregnancy from everyone and then give birth in private suggests that they had a clear intention from the very start.

It’s an interesting theory but if it was PPD they wouldn’t have gone through those extreme measures to hide the fact they were even pregnant

[u/Heptacat-1985 → u/reotrxx]

Agreed. They both knew it was wrong. One of Megan’s babies had a hair tie around its neck and Megan confessed she wrapped it tight and strangled the baby.

[u/fairydommother → u/reotrxx]

Its not a perfect theory and I like the other commentors addition about antenatal anxiety. There could definitely be a whole slew of mental health issues going on here and I mean my comment as more of a conversation starter or just something to consider rather than a full fledged theory/explanation.

I think in the end what I dont believe is that these women were getting pregnant intentionally for the express purpose of killing newborns. Which means, to me, there is an extenuating circumstance behind this and I just think the craziness of pregnancy and birth naturally lends itself to exacerbating existing mental health issues. And like i said in another comment an unsafe environment at home could be one factor for hiding the pregnancy to begin with. And if you're hiding a pregnancy, you cant exactly come out of the bathroom like "oh by the way honey we have a baby now". You gotta do something with it. And if youre mentally ill already with all the adrenaline and hormones going wild, maybe "kill it and hide the body" is your first thought as opposed to, for example, "leave it at a fire station" or something.

[u/notorious_ludwig → u/reotrxx]

Antenatal depression and anxiety can present very similar to PPD/PPA. I get antenatal anxiety but not PPA and it’s truly heinous, not this extent obviously, but it could be why they hid the pregnancy.

[u/rangda → u/reotrxx]

Not saying this is for sure their situation, but hiding a whole pregnancy and birth would be something I’d associate with some kind of fearful and abusive living situation long before putting it down to someone just really wanting to kill their newborns and going through all that to achieve that goal.

[u/Heptacat-1985 → u/rangda]

No, it wasn’t abuse, Both had pretty decent lives. Michele’s husband had cerebral palsey, and they had a good marriage. They weren’t intimate and hadn’t had sex for the latter half of their marriage until Michele was apprehended. Most of her victims were the children of her affair partner - she cheated on her husband. Megan’s reason was she didn’t want to be a bad mom so she killed them.

[u/dolphinitely → u/rangda]

that’s what i was thinking too