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Jessica McClure Morales, famously remembered as “Baby Jessica” from her 1987 rescue from a well, has been arrested following an alleged domestic violence incident.
Sgt. Thomas Gray of the Midland County Sheriff’s Office confirmed to Oxygen that Morales was taken into custody on April 11.
The 40-year-old faces charges of assault causing bodily injury in a family violence case. She was subsequently released from the Midland County Detention Center after posting bail, as indicated by jail records and a report by KMID.
According to Gray, no further information will be disclosed regarding the case. It remains unclear if Morales has secured legal representation.
Morales first captured global attention on October 14, 1987, when she fell into a well in her aunt’s backyard in Midland, Texas, as reported by People.
Morales first made headlines on Oct. 14, 1987 when she fell down a well in her aunt’s backyard in Midland, Texas, People reported.
The 18-month-old—known to many as “Baby Jessica”—was trapped approximately 22-feet underground inside the small well as rescuers rushed to save her. Nearly 60 hours into the ordeal, Morales was saved after rescuers drilled a parallel shaft and horizontal tunnel to reach the well.
The story of her heroic rescue was later recounted in the 1989 made-for-TV movie, Everybody’s Baby: The Rescue of Jessica McClure.
Where is Baby Jessica Now?
Thirty years after the rescue, Morales—who had become a special education teacher’s aide—told People that she believed her “life was a miracle.”
“In a way I guess it happened the way it was supposed to,” she told the outlet in 2017. “I was picked on because of it, but most people are kind and think what happened is an amazing miracle. It is. I don’t believe that any of it would’ve happened without God.”
At the time, she was living a quiet life with her husband and two children and shared that many people within the Midland community still referred to her as “Baby Jessica.”
Morales said hoped her own children would learn from how the community banded together to save her, adding “if you look hard enough, there are so many good people in this world.”