Months before police found a 10-year-old Arizona girl dead on a highway near Concho, she escaped from her home and pleaded for help, according to newly-released police reports.
Police records obtained by AZ Family indicated that nine months before her death, Rebekah Baptiste ran away from her Phoenix home, before the family moved to Concho.
Medical staff at Phoenix Children’s Hospital and police interviewed her, and she claimed her father, Richard Baptiste, 32, and his girlfriend, Anicia Woods, 29, had been torturing her.
As CrimeOnline previously reported, Holbrook police discovered Rebekah Baptiste unresponsive between Highway 77 and 180, near a Concho campsite, in July. Despite life-saving measures, she passed away days later, at Phoenix Children’s hospital.
Police subsequently arrested Baptiste and Woods. They’re both facing first-degree murder, child abuse, and child molestation charges.
In the recent release, police described the victim jumping out of her bedroom window and running to a nearby store for help.
“[Rebekah] jumped from a two-story window in an apartment complex. She ran to at least one homeless person asking for help and then ran to the QT. She told the manager that she was being abused by her stepmother,” Kole Soderquist with the Apache County Sheriff’s Office said during a September court hearing.
“She had bruises from head to toe. There were injuries to her vaginal and anus area.”
Rebekah showed police signs of abuse, including bruising and a bloody lip. She told police she had been hit with brushes and belts and made to do strenuous exercises for “acting out,” FOX 10 reports.
During an interview with the parents, they both claimed the victim had been engaging in self harm and denied any form of abuse. Police returned Rebekah to the home, citing lack of witnesses.
However, over the past year, other family members and the staff at Empower College Prep said they filed reports to Arizona’s Department of Child Safety after concerns about Rebekah being abused, 12 News reports.
It took prosecutors months to gather evidence, but by that time, Rebekah was dead. A 36-page probable-cause affidavit from the Navajo County Sheriff’s Office showed numerous times in which the abuse intensified, prompting the victim’s attempts to escape.
The suspects are being held on a $1 million bond each in the Apache County Jail.
Meanwhile, lawmakers have reportedly put together a bipartisan Child Abuse Task Force and are working toward reforms in the 2026 session.
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[Feature Photo: Rebekah Baptiste/Handout]
