Mom Shoots Child in the FACE – Say’s It Was Worth It

A Wyoming mother told authorities the death of her own 11-month-old son was worth it, so long as his father never got custody.

Quick Take

Madeline Veronique Daly, 36, of Worland, Wyoming, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder on August 24, 2026, in Grant County, New Mexico.
She fled Wyoming with her son, Basil, after losing custody, violating a court order in the process.
Authorities say she shot the baby during a standoff with police near an RV in rural New Mexico.
The case shows how far custody conflicts can escalate when one parent refuses to accept a court’s ruling.

A Custody Order Ignored, Then a Baby Vanishes

Daly lost custody of her son in Wyoming. Rather than accept the ruling, she took the boy anyway on November 16, 2025, according to Cowboy State Daily. That act violated a standing custody order and turned a family dispute into a criminal case almost overnight.

Weeks passed with no sign of the child. Investigators issued a felony warrant on December 3, 2025, accusing Daly of custody interference after she vanished with her son, then just 10 months old. The search stretched across state lines, ending far from where it began.

The father, Jake Stoner, had legal custody at the time Daly disappeared with their son. The two were never married, but a court had already settled who would raise the boy. Daly’s decision to run instead of comply set the stage for the tragedy that followed weeks later.

A Standoff in Rural New Mexico Ends in Tragedy

The search ended December 23, 2025, when officials say Daly shot and killed her son during a standoff with law enforcement near an recreational vehicle in Grant County, New Mexico. Officers had been negotiating a handoff of the child when the shooting happened, according to Cowboy State Daily’s original report on the case.

Grant County prosecutors charged Daly with first-degree murder and first-degree child abuse resulting in death. She was booked into the Grant County Detention Center and held without the option of a quick release, as the severity of the charges reflected the nature of the crime.

Daly initially pleaded not guilty. She appeared before Grant County District Judge Thomas Stewart in late January 2026 with her attorney to enter that plea, according to Cowboy State Daily. That stance held for seven months before she reversed course.

A Guilty Plea Closes the Legal Chapter

On August 24, 2026, Daly changed her plea and admitted to first-degree murder in Silver City, according to the Sixth Judicial District Attorney’s office. The plea resolved the case without a trial, though it did not undo the loss at its center. Prosecutors said the shooting was tied directly to Daly’s refusal to let the boy’s father have any role in his life.

Reporting on the case has been blunt about the motive prosecutors described in court. One outlet summarized it plainly: Daly shot her son in the head with a gun specifically to keep him away from his father. Her stated view of the outcome, that losing her son was an acceptable price for denying custody, defines the case as much as any legal filing.

A woman has been convicted of killing her infant son after she took him across state lines against a court order.

In August 2026, 36-year-old Madeline Veronique Daly, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for the death of her 11-month-old son, Basil Stoner

On December 23,… pic.twitter.com/cApiKiNTgD

— True Crime Avenue (@trurcrimeave) August 29, 2026

Custody Fights Rarely End This Way, But They Do End This Way

Researchers who study child killings inside families call this pattern spousal revenge filicide, where a parent harms a child to punish the other parent. Studies note custody disputes and infidelity as the most common triggers for this specific, rare category of crime.

One long-running analysis found parents were arrested for killing their own children about 500 times a year over a 32-year stretch in the United States, out of hundreds of thousands of total arrests studied. That number underscores this case is not without precedent, even if it remains statistically uncommon against the backdrop of custody battles nationwide.

Family courts settle custody disputes every day without violence. Daly’s case stands out precisely because she rejected that system outright, choosing flight and then gunfire over compliance. Her guilty plea closes the criminal matter, but it leaves behind a father who lost his son to the very parent a court had already ruled against.