Fremont Co. District Attorney believes accused baby killer got with baby’s mom just to ‘get laid’

CAÑON CITY, Colo. (KRDO) -- The 11th Judicial District Attorney minced no words when she provided 13 Investigates with details on a case involving a 21-year-old man accused of killing a baby at a Motel 6.

On May 21, 10-month-old Edward Haynes was found unresponsive in a Cañon City motel room. Edward died later at Children's Hospital in Colorado Springs.

The circumstances surrounding why the suspect, 21-year-old William Jacobs, was living with Edward and his mother have been unknown. Now, 11th Judicial District Attorney Linda Stanley is sounding off on the case.

According to court records, Jacobs had just begun living with Edward's mother, Brook Crawford, before the baby's death.

"I'm going to be very blunt here. He has zero investment in this child. Zero. He's watching that baby so he can get laid. That's it. And have a place to sleep," Stanley told 13 Investigates. "I'm sorry to be that blunt, but honest to God, that's what's going on."

Court records state Jacobs was staying at the Motel 6 for a few days before he met Crawford, who was working as a front desk person that the Motel 6. Days later, the pair moved in together in the very same room where Edward was found unresponsive with signs of abuse.

"I had just had so many buzzers going off when they said the boyfriend was watching him," Stanley said. "There was a whole lot of things indicative of a prior incident with that baby."

During an interview with Cañon City police detectives, arrest documents state Jacobs admitted to biting Edward on the arm "while playing with him" and hitting Edward's head on a door frame while trying to make him throw up a few days earlier.

According to the affidavit, Jacobs claimed Brook left Edward alone in the room for 30 minutes when she left for work. He claimed he "wouldn't have had time to injure Edward "and denied that the mother didn't leave the room until he got back.

Stanley believes Crawford saw an opportunity to live with Jacobs and have someone who could care for her child while she was away from the Motel 6 room where they were living.

"I think she saw a live-in babysitter. Now she can just really pound out the hours, right? She's got a live-in babysitter," Stanley said.

The 11th DA says she was worried Jacobs would be "gone" if they didn't arrest him soon after the baby's death. This was because, according to Stanley, Jacobs was just recently "released from custody." 13 Investigates learned that Jacobs was previously arrested as a teen for unknown crimes in Colorado. His juvenile case file is not a public record and the Cañon City police nor the DA's office can release further information.

"I said you got to hook him because he's going to be gone. He knows what's going on. He's no dummy to this process and what's happening and he knows what he did," Stanley said.

Tuesday, Jacobs was in court on his juvenile case filed in 2017. His attorneys were attempting to get him "un-registered" as a sex offender, alluding to the fact that he was previously convicted of a sex offense. In court, the judge said that his mother was the named victim in the case, but no further details on what happened in 2017 were revealed in open court.

The judge ultimately decided he can be removed from the sex offender database because he is not currently accused of any crimes that involve "unlawful sexual contact." The prosecutor inside the courtroom, David Little, did not object to this largely because he was unaware Jacobs was supposed to appear in court Tuesday. Little chalked the error up to a "coding error" between the DA's office docket and the court clerk's docket.

Jacobs' mom did not object to her son being removed as a sex offender. It's unclear what sort of sentence Jacobs received in the aforementioned juvenile case.

Nonetheless, DA Stanley says she feels strongly about the alleged murder of Edward. She is choosing to prosecute this case herself to bring justice to Hayes' family members. She stands by her decision to upgrade charges against Jacobs from child abuse resulting in death to 1st-degree murder in the days after Hayes was pronounced dead at Children's Hospital.

"I'm confident we have that evidence or else I wouldn't have charged it," Stanley said.

13 Investigates reached out Jacobs' attorney for comment on Stanley's words. We are still awaiting his response.