Nancy Gerwatowski biography: 13 things about Gillette, Wyoming woman

Who is Nancy Gerwatowski?

Nancy Ann Gerwatowski is an American woman from Gillette, Wyoming, United States. She is Kara Kristine Gerwatowski‘s mother and Jenna Gerwatowski‘s grandmother.

Aside from Gillette, Nancy has lived in other parts of Wyoming including Wamsutter, Pinedale, Rock Springs, Big Piney and Cody. She previously lived in Grass Valley, California, USA and Newberry, Luce County, Michigan, USA.

In 1997, Nancy delivered a baby girl alone at her residence in Newberry and the baby girl died due to asphyxiation. The mother concealed her deceased newborn in an outhouse at a Garnet Lake campground in Hudson Township, Lenawee County, Michigan.

According to an autopsy and forensics tests, the baby had gestated for 38-40 weeks or about full term. For more than four decades, the identity of the baby, dubbed Baby Garnet, was a mystery.

In 2022, a deoxyribonucleic acid profile of Baby Garnet was developed. The results led investigators to Nancy while she was living in Pinedale.

Kara and Baby Garnet have different fathers. Here are 13 more things about their mother:

1. On June 1, 1997, she discarded Baby Garnet in the waste pit of the Garnet Lake campground.
2. On June 26, 1997, a worker emptying a septic pit at the Garnet Lake campground found Baby Garnet there and she was able to hide the fact that she was the dead baby’s mother.
3. In April 1982, she gave birth to Kara.
4. In 2000, she and Kara stopped communicating because they had a bad relationship.
5. In 2001, her daughter Kara gave birth to Jenna.
6. In 2017, a Michigan State Police detective sergeant reopened the case involving the baby she delivered in 1997 and initiated familial genetic genealogical tracing with the assistance of a private laboratory and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
7. In 2020, a laboratory received remains of the baby she delivered in 1997 to test.
8. In May 2022, a detective from the Michigan State Police called Jenna and asked her granddaughter about the Baby Garnet case.
9. On June 1, 2022, detectives spoke with her daughter Kara, who agreed to provide her DNA.
10. On July 12, 2022, investigators traveled to Pinedale to interview her and she confirmed she was the mother of Baby Garnet.
11. On May 10, 2024, Honorable Beth Ann Gibson of the 92nd District Court in St. Ignace, Mackinac County, Michigan issued an opening and order binding over her to stand trial for the cold-case murder of Baby Garnet.
12. In October 2024, she turned 61.
13. On December 12, 2024, her defense argued in a hearing that the case against her should be dropped in its entirety because the state of Michigan cannot prove Baby Garnet was born alive.