Judge orders baby’s body to be retained in murder case against Regis University professor

A Denver County judge on Friday ordered in an unusual move that the body of the baby found dead last month in the home of a Regis University professor be held for 30 days rather than released to his family. the child for cremation.

The baby’s father, Nicholas Myklebust, 44, is charged with first-degree murder in connection with the death of his wife Seorin Kim, 44. Police found Kim with fatal injuries and the couple’s 2½-month-old daughter, Lesley Kim , dead in the family. home in the 3200 block of North Syracuse Street on July 29.

Seorin Kim suffered apparent blunt force injuries, police said, and Myklebust had bruises on his hands and scratches on his body. He claimed his wife fell from a step stool, but the woman’s injuries did not match his story, police said.

Lesley was found with no visible external injuries and the manner and cause of her death have not yet been determined. She is the second child to die in Myklebust’s care – the couple’s first child, Bear Myklebust, died in 2021 at the age of 9 days. No charges were filed in his death, although he suffered skull fractures.

District Court Judge Ericka Englert ordered Friday that Lesley’s body be held at the Denver Medical Examiner’s office for 30 days, even though pathologists there have completed their work.

“In this case it is an unusual situation because there is no death and no cause of death is stated,” she said. “We don’t have the autopsy report yet. The defense does not have the results of tests. And releasing the body at this time would likely lead to, for lack of a better term, destruction of the evidence.”

Pathologists performed a full autopsy on Lesley’s body, but don’t expect the final autopsy report to be ready for three to five months due to various tests currently underway, said Breena Meng, an attorney with the Denver District Attorney’s Office. She represented the medical examiner’s office during Friday’s hearing.

Myklebust has not been charged with his daughter’s murder, but could be, said his public defender, Rebecca Butler-Dines. Because of that potential, she asked to hold Lesley’s body until all tests were completed so the defense team could review the prosecution’s findings and then possibly continue its own tests, she said in court Friday.

“Given the complexity of child abuse cases, and particularly child death cases, and how often the case comes down to a dispute between experts, we do not find it unacceptable for the medical examiner’s office to detain the child until we review additional information . information about their findings,” said Butler-Dines.

Prosecutor Anthony Santos, who called the defense’s request an “unprecedented situation,” said it was not appropriate for the medical examiner’s office to hold Lesley’s body “indefinitely” while the defense team considered its options.

“If the defense wants additional information from their expert, I’m all for that, but they have to do it,” he said. “They can’t just wait.”