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Middlesex County resident Devoni Miller of Cromwell was arrested by Connecticut State Police on Thursday, Dec. 21 in connection with the death of her daughter, Deroyal Miller, in September 2023, authorities announced.
State Police took Miller into custody shortly after she was arrested by Cromwell Police in connection to a crash that occurred just before the child's death.
According to police, the events leading up to the girl's death began on Monday, Sept. 11 just before 5:30 p.m., when a Hyundai Sonata SE driven by Miller struck the back of another vehicle on Route 9 southbound in Cromwell near Exit 25. She then drove away from the scene of the collision, striking the other car two more times in the process. She then drove to the Route 9 Exit 25 on-ramp, where she hit the rear of another vehicle in front of her, authorities said.
Miller then sped away from the scene and continued onto Route 9, driving across all the southbound lanes, crossing the grass median, continuing across the northbound lanes, and slamming into a metal guardrail on the east side of the highway over a steep embankment that leads down to the Connecticut River, according to police.
After this crash, another vehicle pulled over next to the wreck. The passengers inside this vehicle began calling 911 while witnessing Miller holding her daughter. Miller soon approached the car and reached into the front seat to end the 911 call before exiting back out onto Route 9 and walking away from the scene, according to Miller's arrest warrant.
At this point, State Police and Cromwell officers began a search for Miller that eventually ended around 7:15 p.m., when she walked back to the scene of the crash on Route 9 North. When police found her, she was wearing only undergarments and stated that she and her daughter had swam in the river before directing officers to look for her daughter in the water, the arrest warrant said.
The 2-year-old child was later discovered on a pile of rocks by the river around 8 p.m. and was pronounced dead at Middlesex Hospital around an hour and a half later.
According to the arrest warrant, an investigation eventually determined that after the two separate hit-run crashes, Miller had driven across the four lanes and the median of Route 9 without trying to stop or slow down. She then intentionally placed her daughter into the Connecticut River in an attempt to cause her death, police said.
During the investigation, Miller's family and coworkers told authorities that she had been acting erratically in the days leading up to the incident and that her mother and another person had tried to separate her from her daughter the day before her death but had been unable to, according to the warrant.
Following her arrest, Miller was charged with:
- Murder;
- First-degree reckless endangerment;
- Interfering with an emergency call;
- Reckless driving
- Evading responsibility in operation of other vehicles;
- Risk of injury to a child.
Miller was held on a $1 million court-set bond before being transferred to the Connecticut Department of Corrections. She is scheduled to be arraigned in Middletown Superior Court on Friday, Dec. 22.
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