Derek Rayo and Kelly Richardson are accused of murder in the fentanyl poisoning death of their infant daughter. (Courtroom screenshot from San Francisco’s KRON-TV/YouTube; mug shots from San Jose Police Department)
A roommate and his girlfriend are now charged after being accused of providing drugs to a couple accused in the death of their 18-month-old daughter, who was killed by fentanyl a drug-littered home in California.
Phil Ortega, 31, and his girlfriend, Paige Vitale, were charged with murder in the death of baby Winter Rayo, according to court documents. The suspects join Winter’s parents, Derek Rayo, 27, and Kelly Richardson, 28, who were charged in November.
A statement of facts obtained by Law&Crime claims Ortega and Vitale “enabled repeated narcotics” use by both themselves and Derek Rayo and Richardson, which exposed the baby to “lethal concentrations of narcotics.”
“Messages indicate that suspect Ortega consistently provided Derek Rayo and Kelly Richardson with fentanyl between November 2022 and the death of Victim W. Doe,” court documents stated.
Authorities said that Ortega, who admitted to being an opiate addict with a history of drug-related crimes dating back to 2015, left drugs around the house and sold Richardson drugs despite knowing she was behaving recklessly around her daughter with them, according to court documents.
Vitale expressed her belief that Derek Rayo and Richardson were “reckless” in their parenting of the victim, court documents said.
She reportedly discussed practices that worried her, such as smoking narcotics around the baby named W. Doe in court documents, or “failing to wash hands around W. Doe after using narcotics.”
“That’s very frightening and incredibly dangerous stuff,” she allegedly said, according to the statement of facts. “Suspect Vitale even stated that she had brought up her concerns about Derek Rayo and Kelly Richardson’s drug use.”
Ortega and Vitale also took on roles as the baby’s caretakers even though there were narcotic activities in their house, authorities alleged.
“Paige Vitale and Phillip Ortega knew that fentanyl and methamphetamine were dangerous to human life, as evidenced by their statements and past experiences,” the document said. “Despite this knowledge, they actively took actions that would naturally and likely lead to W. Doe’s exposure to fentanyl and methamphetamine. That exposure resulted in the death of W. Doe, an 18-month-old toddler.”
The case came to light on Aug. 12. Derek Rayo called 911 at 11:07 p.m. to report his daughter was unconscious and not breathing on his bed, authorities said. He told dispatch he did not know what happened, and that he and Richardson were alone in the home with their daughter, court documents said.
San Jose Fire and Emergency Medical Services responded to the home in San Jose, about 50 miles south of San Francisco, and found the baby lying on a bed, covered with a rug. She was declared dead 10 minutes after her father had called 911. But she had been dead for hours and showed signs of full rigor mortis. She had dilated pupils and blue lips, court documents said.
In an interview with investigators, Derek Rayo supposedly confessed to using a lot of methamphetamine, heroin, and fentanyl, and he described the baby’s last hours. He supposedly mentioned that he woke up at one point and saw that his daughter was not conscious or breathing. He also admitted to not immediately calling the police because he had warrants and wanted to grieve with Kelly Richardson but knew that they would be separated once police arrived. He thought he might have fallen asleep on top of his daughter or rolled over onto her.
Richardson supposedly told authorities that she had gone to work and left her daughter in Derek Rayo’s care while their roommates were home. She supposedly said she put her daughter to bed between 1 and 2 a.m. and went to sleep. When she woke up at 10:30 a.m., she did not notice anything wrong with her daughter before falling back to sleep, according to court documents.
When she woke up again between 11 a.m. and noon, she noticed Derek Rayo on top of the victim and nudged him so he would get off of her. She then claimed she tried to wake her daughter up and saw that her lips were blue. Derek Rayo tried CPR but she did not think it was effective. She also said that her boyfriend thought he had a warrant and was scared of being arrested.
“Upon realizing Victim W. Doe had died, Derek Rayo and Kelly Richardson did not call the police for approximately twelve hours,” court documents said.
In the home, investigators found a white chunky powder — that later tested positive for fentanyl — on the nightstand, a scraping tool with residue on a desk, another scraping tool with residue on a rug under Winter’s body and narcotics paraphernalia, the statement of facts said.
The baby had a lethal fentanyl blood concentration of 74 ng/ml in her blood. A 3 ng/ml of fentanyl blood concentration is potentially lethal, according to the coroner’s office.
Authorities said text and social media messages, photos, and videos showed the couple “recklessly using narcotics” while holding the victim or while she was nearby and drugs and paraphernalia around in the house, within reach of the baby.