Ex-Long Island woman charged in killing of newborn found in Commack movie theater toilet 30 years ago

A 59-year-old Virginia woman has been charged with murder in Suffolk County in the 1996 killing of her newborn baby boy, whose body was found dumped in a toilet at a Commack movie theater, authorities said Thursday, after investigators linked her to the baby through DNA and she allegedly confessed to giving birth to the baby and then covering him with toilet paper. 

Michelle Chronick Tyson was arrested Wednesday in Hampton, Virginia. She waived extradition to Suffolk County, where she pleaded not guilty Thursday to an indictment charging her with two counts of second-degree murder in Suffolk County Court in Riverhead. 

Tyson, who initially denied being pregnant with the child when confronted by Suffolk investigators this summer — almost 30 years after the baby's killing — ultimately admitted she had given birth to the baby in the bathroom stall, court records show.

"I didn't know if it was a boy or girl. ... I just remembered it being born and I cleaned myself up and didn't look back at anything," Tyson said, according to a eight-page bail letter to the judge. "I put the toilet paper on top of the baby. I couldn't bring that home. There was nothing I could do about it. I just walked away." 

State Supreme Court Justice Steven Pilewski ordered Tyson held without bail Thursday. Her defense attorney, Christopher Gioe, of Hauppauge, said he reserved his right to petition the court for bail at a later date. 

"This defendant made a choice back in 1996 to take her newborn child’s life before he ever had the chance to experience the world beyond his first few breaths," Suffolk District Attorney Ray Tierney said in a statement. "The alleged circumstances of this infant’s death are deeply disturbing, and the fact that nearly three decades have passed does not diminish the gravity of this crime. Every child deserves the chance to live, to grow and to thrive. This infant was robbed of that chance, and we are committed to pursuing justice for a life that was tragically and selfishly cut short."

Gioe, speaking to Newsday after the arraignment, said: "We did enter a plea of not guilty on her behalf. And we look forward to litigating this case and seeing what the truth is." 

Suffolk Assistant District Attorney Dana Castaldo said in court Thursday that Tyson went to the movies with her son, his friend and other family members to see the movie "Space Jam" on Nov. 17, 1996 — the weekend it premiered in theaters. 

Tyson hid the pregnancy from her husband, who was not the father of the baby, as well as the rest of her family, Castaldo said.

The Commack Multiplex, which closed in 2011, was located at 100 Express Dr. N.. Tyson gave birth in a stall, Castaldo said. Castaldo said Tyson used toilet paper to cover up the child who was "utterly defenseless" inside of the toilet.

The baby was found about 12:30 a.m. on Nov. 18, 1996, facedown in the toilet water by the custodian, completely covered by toilet paper. The full-term newborn was found with its placenta and an attached umbilical cord, the bail letter said. 

"Toilet paper completely concealed the baby from view," Castaldo said. "The baby was full term, healthy and born alive." 

The baby's cause of death was ruled asphyxiation due to submergence in water, she said.

"[Tyson] then left the bathroom and did not tell anyone about what had occurred," Castaldo said.

An autopsy found the baby had air and "watery fluid" in his stomach, "frothy fluid in upper airway and lungs" and "acerated  lungs" as well as petechiae, which are pinpoint-sized spots caused by broken capillaries, on his face and thymus gland, the bail letter said. 

A 1996 Newsday article quoted Suffolk police saying the baby appeared to have been born in the bathroom, as the placenta was found with the baby, and then suffocated. Police said then that the baby was not stillborn, had breathed on his own but then died by asphyxiation. 

A cleaning employee found the baby in the toilet at 12:42 a.m. in the women's bathroom. A homicide detective told Newsday at the time that the baby's face was not in the water and the baby did not drown. 

Police asked then for help in identifying the mother and said investigators were checking video from theater's lobby to aid the search. But the case grew cold. 

Castaldo said the case was reanalyzed in 2024 by the Cold Case Task Force, consisting of members of the Suffolk police and the district attorney's office, using recent advancements in DNA technology. The baby's blood sample, which was taken at autopsy, was submitted to a private lab, which generated a single nucleotide polymorphism DNA profile.

The task force, which worked with an investigative genealogist to narrow the pool of potential matches, identified the child's father first on Aug. 4. Prosecutors have not identified him, but said he has been "cooperative." He told investigators he recalled having unprotected sex several times with a woman named "Michelle," whose last name he could not remember, in early 1996. He said he met Michelle while he was working at a Farmingdale deli. 

On Aug. 26, the task force obtained a search warrant to seize a buccal swab from Tyson and subsequent DNA analysis confirmed Tyson was the biological mother of the baby.

The baby's biological father was unaware Tyson, who was married to another man at the time, was ever pregnant with his child. 

"At first, this defendant denied being pregnant in the 1990s," Castaldo said.

Tyson, who lived in Brentwood in 1996, told investigators she "never spoke to anyone about what happened inside the bathroom or the baby," Castaldo told the judge.

Tyson was living in a group home in Hampton, Virginia, at the time of her arrest, according to prosecutors and Virginia court records. Tyson is estranged from the son who she brought to the movies that day, Castaldo said.

Tyson, who is unemployed, has four prior felony convictions in Virginia — for grand larceny in 2015, forgery in 2016 and obtaining money under false pretenses in 2016 and again in 2017 — and a misdemeanor conviction in Nassau County. She served about eight months in jail on her Virginia convictions, the bail letter said. 

She faces 25 years to life in prison if convicted of the top charge.

In her interview with Suffolk investigators this summer, she expressed regret. 

"I know it's wrong and I've thought about it over the years, but there was nothing that I could do," she said.