Woman sentenced for killing pregnant woman, hoping to claim baby was hers

Springfield, Mo. — A Missouri woman has been sentenced to two life terms in prison for killing a pregnant Arkansas woman and trying to pass off the dead woman's fetus as her own stillborn baby.

Amber Waterman, 44, of Pineville, Missouri, is not eligible for parole under the sentence ordered Tuesday, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. She pleaded guilty in July to kidnapping resulting in death and causing the death of a child in utero.

In her plea, Waterman admitted that she used a false name to contact Ashley Bush of Siloam Springs, Arkansas, on Facebook. Bush, 33, was about 31 weeks pregnant at the time.

Federal prosecutors said Waterman and Bush agreed to meet at an Arkansas convenience store on Oct. 31, 2022. Waterman said she would help Bush get a job, but instead she drove Bush to her own home in Pineville.

Hours later, first responders rushed to a store in Pineville after getting a report that a baby was not breathing. The baby was pronounced dead.

Waterman at first claimed she had given birth to the baby in a truck while on the way to the hospital. In her plea, she admitted the baby was Bush's.

An autopsy indicated that Bush, who was also the mother of three other children, died as a result of penetrating trauma of the torso. The baby, Valkyrie Willis, died in utero, prosecutors said.

Waterman's husband, Jamie Waterman, 44, pleaded guilty Tuesday to one count of being an accessory after the fact to the kidnapping resulting in death.

Charging documents say he helped wrap Bush's body in a tarp, burn it and then move the remains to another location.

He could get up to 15 years in federal prison without parole, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

At Amber Waterman's sentencing, the judge said he couldn't impose a sentence that would be sufficient in this case, saying Amber Waterman's crime was a "new level of graphic," CBS Springfield affiliate KOLR-TV reports.

Prosecutors also spoke during the proceedings and said the pain caused by Amber Waterman would span generations, while her defense attorneys declined to speak, saying they preferred not to due a case pending against her in Arkansas.

According to KLOR, one Bush family member said during the sentencing hearing that she prayed "suffering comes back tenfold" to Amber Waterman, and another said she is the "face of Satan" and "has a black soul."