Boyfriend admits aiding Twin Cities mom after she drowned baby in hotel tub, put body in dumpster

A man admitted Monday to his role in disposing a baby’s body that ended up in a Twin Cities landfill after the mother drowned the boy in a hotel bathtub.

Despite a painstaking search, Bloomington Deputy Police Chief Kim Clauson said Monday that nearly a year later, 7-month-old Mateo Harding’s remains were never found.

Edwin Cosmo Trudeau, 19, of Minnetonka pleaded guilty in Hennepin County District Court to aiding an offender after the fact in connection with the death of Mateo on Feb. 28, 2024.

The plea agreement between the prosecution and the defense calls for a sentence of no more than seven years. In the meantime, Trudeau remains free on bond ahead of sentencing scheduled for May 5.

Following sentencing, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said in a statement, “This was a devastating act that Mr. Trudeau attempted to help conceal.”

Police went through the massive Pine Bend landfill in southeastern Inver Grove Heights in search of the boy who prosecutors say was thrown away in a dumpster after his death in a room at the Quality Inn in the 800 block of E. American Boulevard.

Mateo’s mother, 21-year-old Esperanza R. Harding, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, and she’s scheduled to be sentenced on March 6. Prosecutors have indicated they intend to seek a term of 32 years.

Harding, who had no permanent address at the time of the killing, put her son’s body in a backpack and disposed it in a dumpster outside the hotel, according to the charges. The dumpster’s contents were then hauled to the privately operated landfill.

Police were sent to Children’s Minnesota hospital in Minneapolis a week later regarding a missing child. Harding told them her baby son died of natural causes in the hospital. However, there was no record of the child having been there.

Eventually, Harding admitted to Minneapolis police that she drowned her son in her hotel room bathtub, wrapped up the body, put it in a backpack and threw it in a dumpster.

Harding said it was Trudeau’s idea to throw her son in the dumpster and not to tell anyone.

“If you go down, I go down, no matter what,” the charges quoted him as telling her. “It is always going to be us, Bonnie and Clyde.”

He admitted to police that he went to the hotel room and found Mateo dead. He added that he didn’t call for help but instead had sex with Harding.

Harding told Bloomington police that Trudeau did not like her son and wanted her to put him up for adoption as a way to “prove that he was her top priority,” the charges read. Harding went on to explain that she was mad that the boy was crying and making it difficult for her to enjoy her bath.