{"id":313620,"date":"2026-05-13T12:45:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T12:45:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/313620\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T12:45:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T12:45:18","slug":"san-jose-parents-convicted-of-murder-for-death-of-winter-rayo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/313620\/","title":{"rendered":"San Jose parents convicted of murder for death of Winter Rayo"},"content":{"rendered":"

(KRON) \u2014 A jury convicted a San Jose couple of murdering their 19-month-old daughter, Winter Rayo, after the toddler was killed from fentanyl poisoning.<\/p>\n

Winter\u2019s father, 29-year-old Derek Rayo, and mother, 31-year-old Kelly Richardson, left the toddler in a room with fentanyl and methamphetamine on Aug. 12,\u00a02023. Rayo and Richardson waited more than 11 hours before calling 911 to report that their daughter was dead, prosecutors said.<\/p>\n

Rayo told the 911 dispatcher, \u201cWe don\u2019t know what happened,\u201d court documents state.<\/p>\n

An autopsy found that Winter had 25 times the lethal amount of fentanyl in her blood, and more undigested fentanyl in her stomach, prosecutors said.<\/p>\n

Jurors convicted Rayo and Richardson of second-degree murder on Friday.<\/p>\n

\"Baby<\/p>\n

Baby Winter\u2019s parents, Derek Rayo and Kelly Richardson, are seen in mugshots provided by the San Jose Police Department.<\/p>\n

The Santa Clara County District Attorney\u2019s Office wrote, \u201cWinter\u2019s parents were the first in Santa Clara County\u2019s history to be charged and now convicted of murdering their own child by exposure to fentanyl. When the couple is sentenced at a later date, they each face a maximum of 15-years-to-life in prison.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFentanyl kills,\u201d District Attorney Jeff Rosen said. \u201cIn this case, the powerful opioid was left around this toddler like a loaded gun. The criminal recklessness of these two defendants killed their own child. I thank the jury for giving that child\u2019s tragically short life some meaning.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Winter<\/p>\n

Winter Rayo (Photo courtesy Santa Clara County District Attorney\u2019s Office)<\/p>\n

Prosecutors said the parents knew about the dangers of their drug use, however, they were regularly under the influence of narcotics while caring for Winter.\u00a0Rayo\u2019s father worked as a drug and alcohol counselor, and Rayo had \u201cnumerous\u201d friends who died of fentanyl overdoses, court documents show.<\/p>\n

\u201cPhotographs showed that the couple endangered the victim by regularly keeping narcotics and drug paraphernalia in their home, within reach of Winter,\u201d the DA\u2019s office wrote.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors also charged the couple\u2019s drug dealer, Phillip Ortega<\/a>, with murder.<\/p>\n

Winter was born on Christmas Eve 2021. Ortega lived with Winter and her parents at 1550 Huddersfield Court for five months leading up to the toddler\u2019s death, court documents state.<\/p>\n

The trio used drugs together inside the house while holding Winter, or pinning her nose with a clothespin, prosecutors said.<\/p>\n

Ortega\u2019s case remains pending in court.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/p>\n

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KRON4. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(KRON) \u2014 A jury convicted a San Jose couple of murdering their 19-month-old daughter, Winter Rayo, after the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":313621,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[45007,129230,129229,131304,88,90,89,2125,198,3162,131303],"class_list":["post-313620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-court-documents","tag-derek-rayo","tag-kelly-richardson","tag-rayo","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-san-jose-police-department","tag-santa-clara-county","tag-winter","tag-winter-rayo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=313620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313620\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/313621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=313620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=313620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=313620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}