AUSTIN (KXAN) — The case of Magen Fieramusca, the Austin woman accused of killing her best friend, Heidi Broussard, before kidnapping her baby and trying to pass it off as her own child was scheduled to appear in the 460th District Court of Travis County Wednesday for the next round of pretrial hearings.
Broussard was found dead in the trunk of a car near a home in Jersey Village, Texas in December 2019. Broussard’s baby, who was three weeks old at the time, was found alive in good condition.
Fieramusca herself did not appear because she was placed in a COVID unit at the jail and couldn’t be brought in, according to the court. However, the attorneys still met with the judge to provide updates on the case and reschedule the hearing.
Once the attorneys approached the bench, the judge addressed the fact that Fieramusca has been in custody for over 1,000 days and emphasized the need to move forward with the next steps in the case.
The judge informed the attorneys that if the two parties could not agree on a resolution soon, the case would go to a jury trial this March.
Fieramusca is now scheduled to appear in court on Jan. 31 for her arraignment hearing.
This would have been Fieramusca’s first in-person court appearance since May 2022 when the state and defense attorneys presented arguments regarding the evidence the Texas Rangers obtained when they entered Fieramusca’s Houston home on Dec. 19, 2019.
During the May hearing, the defense argued the Texas Rangers didn’t have probable cause to justify a warrantless entry of the home, while the state cited the emergency doctrine necessary to protect and preserve human life and claimed there was “overwhelming evidence” beyond probable cause to enter the home.
Ultimately the judge ruled that evidence obtained by the Texas Rangers could be used in trial after determining that the warrantless entry of the home was justified because law enforcement had reasonable probable cause that a crime/kidnapping happened and that there was a newborn baby who was in imminent danger of serious injury.
Complete coverage of the case
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Austin woman accused of killing friend, stealing her baby makes first court appearance
Fieramusca has been in custody at the Travis County Jail for 754 days on charges of capital murder, tampering with a corpse and two counts of kidnapping.
KXAN will continue to update this story with details of Wednesday’s hearings.