A Louisville, Kentucky, woman will spend nearly a decade behind bars after she took a bath with her 3-month-old on New Year's Day while under the influence of drugs and fell asleep, causing the boy to drown.
Amber Winstead, 36, was sentenced Thursday to nine years behind bars after she pleaded guilty in November to manslaughter in the death of Ki'Arri Rayne Winstead, who died at a motel in Louisville on Jan. 1.
According to prosecutors, Winstead will serve seven years for manslaughter, plus another two years for a parole violation from a 2021 narcotics possession case. She is required to serve 85 percent of her manslaughter sentence before she becomes eligible for parole. As part of her plea agreement, a persistent felony offender charge was dropped.
On Jan. 1, 2025, police responded to a Motel 6 on Airport Hotel Boulevard around 4:30 a.m. after receiving reports of an unresponsive infant. When they arrived on the scene, they found the child was not breathing. They later determined that Winstead got into the bath with the boy and then fell asleep.
Hours later, someone woke her up. She found Ki'Arri submerged in the water and not breathing.
responders pronounced him dead at the scene.
Winstead was arrested in the funeral home parking lot, moments before her son was laid to rest, her attorney said. At the Friday hearing, Winstead's attorney Bryce Dean told the court that his client is nearing the end of a drug treatment program, and asked that she be placed on house arrest until sentencing.
"When Ms. Winstead was arrested on this case that was at her child's funeral," Dean said, according to WLKY.
"She never attended her child's funeral. She was arrested in the parking lot. She would like to visit her child's grave. She would like to have just a little bit of closure before she goes to DOC."
Jefferson Circuit Court Judge Trish Morris said she would consider the request. "Let me take this under submission and see if I can't figure out some way that we can get you closure because, like the Commonwealth, I have obvious empathy for you as well," Morris said. "The situation is tragic all around."
