EXCLUSIVE: Transgender Baby Killer Released Into Indiana Community 30 Years Before The End of His 55-Year Sentence
A trans-identified male convicted of the grisly murder of an infant has been released on parole a full 30 years early. Jonathan Richardson, who now uses the name Autumn Cordellioné, was convicted in 2002 after his 11-month-old stepdaughter died in his care while her mother was at work. Having served less than half of his 55-year sentence, Richardson was quietly released in late December of 2025.
A statement from the Vanderburgh County Prosecutor’s Office was published on March 26, warning the community of Richardson’s presence, and stating that the Indiana Department of Corrections (IDOC) had failed to notify local officials of the release of a “serious violent felon.”
Prosecutor Diana Moers explained that the County Prosecutor’s Office was not made aware of the IDOC’s decision, but rather Richardson had been spotted by a local who recognized him.
Without an official statement from the DOC, it is unclear why Richardson was released early. However, the decision may have been linked to an injunction granted in state court that required the IDOC to provide Richardson with taxpayer-funded cosmetic surgeries. Releasing Richardson early may have been the IDOC’s strategy to avoid paying for the court-ordered cosmetic enhancements.
As previously reported by Reduxx, in 2023, the ACLU of Indiana filed a legal complaint on behalf of Richardson claiming that the IDOC was subjecting him to “cruel and unusual punishment” by denying him the various plastic surgeries he had demanded.
In the suit, ACLU lawyers refer to Richardson as an “adult transgender female prisoner confined in a male institution,” and complains that “the total ban on gender-affirming surgery violates [his] right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment.”
Among a list of demands prepared by Richardson and presented as evidence in court was a document titled “Surgeries to Reach My Ideal Self.” The first item on the list, the court heard, was a “vagina,” followed by: breast implants, a brow lift, a brow reduction, a tummy tuck, gluteal implants (BBL), a uterus transplant, hair removal, and wigs.
However, during court proceedings Richardson stated that he had amended his demands to two surgeries, an orchiectomy and a penile inversion.
In addition to identifying as transgender, Richardson identifies as “Muslim,” and had launched a separate lawsuit against his prison’s chaplain for being denied a hijab.
During his deposition, Richardson told the legal counsel for the IDOC, Alex Carlisle, that in 2018, he had been informed about gender identity by another male inmate at CIF who went by the name of “Pearl.” According to Richardson, Pearl had brought in pamphlets from California state prisons that explained the concept of “gender identity” and introduced to him, for the first time, the idea of taking feminizing hormones.
“I always knew I was a girl, didn’t know that term applied. Because until I talked to Pearl I didn’t even really know transgender was the name for it. I was hearing at the time that it was transsexualism and that didn’t seem to fit me because it was apparently people that like to wear girl clothes to have sex,” Richardson said in his deposition.
However, Richardson also stated that while briefly married to the mother of the infant he murdered, he had been working in an “adult bookstore” that sold pornographic videos. While employed as a janitor, Richardson would have sex with various male customers while pretending to be a “girl.”
Richardson further testified that he had taken the feminine name “Autumn” after his high school girlfriend, and said that he used to steal his sister’s clothing and his mother’s makeup as a youth. “When I put on the clothes, I could for a second realize the girl inside,” he said.
“I felt I was only a woman when a man used me,” Richardson remarked. “It was the only acceptable time to be a woman so it brought me a certain amount of satisfaction that I was pleasuring a man like a woman would and I got to express who I was.”
Richardson had been serving a 55-year sentence for the murder of his 11-month-old stepdaughter after he had been left to care for the child while her mother was at work. That night, he was visited by friends who observed he was “acting strangely” and refused to invite them in the house as he normally would.
Despite claiming the little girl was sleeping, Richardson had loud music playing in the home, and his guests noted that he appeared to have a fresh, bleeding tattoo of the child’s name carved into his arm. Shortly after his friends left, Richardson went to a neighbor’s home and asked them to call 911, claiming the child was unresponsive. The baby would later die at the hospital, with the cause of death determined to be asphyxiation by manual strangulation.
Richardson was booked awaiting a court hearing, and would later tell a prison official “all I know is I killed the little fucking bitch.” The following year, he was found guilty and sentenced to 55 years in prison.
Since being released, Richardson has created several social media profiles and has launched an OnlyFans, where he says he has been selling pornography of himself.
While Richardson’s exact location in Vanderburgh County is unknown, he has indicated that he is transient and has been living in hotels and other temporary accommodations. One source who reached out to Reduxx alleged that Richardson had been staying at a women’s shelter in the community.
On Reddit, Richardson describes himself as “a transfeminine polyamorous and pansexual and interacts with popular transgender forums. Richardson has also created his own called r/TransFreedom, though as of yet, he is the sole member.
“Come to a community where we care about each transgenders [sic] experience and their struggle, we are an open forum for civil discourse and a safe space to post, if you’re transgender or an ally then your [sic] already welcome regardless of your past,” reads the group’s description.
In other social media posts, the transgender baby killer describes being in a relationship with another man who claims to identify as transgender and was also convicted of killing an infant. In 2015, Cory Wallace set his house on fire in an attempt to cover up the fact that he had battered his 4-month old son to death. The following year, Wallace was convicted of charges including neglect of a dependent resulting in death and arson and sentenced to 72 years in prison.
On February 10, 2015, Wallace called 911 to report that their house was on fire and that the infant was trapped inside. Only four minutes would elapse from the time of his call until firefighters removed the child from the home, yet the boy was already dead.
The forensic pathologist who conducted Jensen Wallace’s autopsy concluded that the infant had died before the fire started, and noted several serious injuries which were inflicted by abuse, including two fractured ribs — one which was recent, and another which had been healing. Additionally, an investigator for the Muncie Fire Department concluded, upon investigation, that the fire was intentionally set.
Wallace admitted to police that he “accidentally” dropped the baby on a hardwood floor, and started a fire after he “freaked out” when the baby wasn’t breathing, according to the Delaware County probable cause affidavit.
An investigation by a local news team revealed that the Department of Child Services (DCS) had been warned about Wallace abusing and neglecting children as far back as 2012.
On April 18, 2023, Wallace, incarcerated at the Pendleton Correctional Facility, filed a petition for a change of the sex marker on his birth certificate because “[he] is living as a [t]ransgender [f]emale.” On July 25, 2023, the trial court dismissed Wallace’s petition. The judge cited “public policy” and an Indiana statute which restricts name changes for incarcerated individuals. Upon appeal, the request for a name change and sex marker alteration was thrown out on the basis that Wallace had not provided sufficient evidence to meet the “good faith” standard required by Indiana law for such changes.
Yet Wallace, who is to spend the rest of his life in prison, has persisted in filing lawsuits against the IDOC. In July 2023 Wallace demanded a hefty payout of $500,000 as compensation for not having been granted state-funded cosmetic surgeries.
“In June 2023, Miss Wallace was informed by Mental Health Staff that she would not be receiving Sexual Reassignment Surgical Evaluation… This amounts to Deliberate Indifference, thus violating her Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment and the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause to basic medical care.”
“I can’t sleep because I miss my trans significant other,” Richardson states in a video he posted to Instagram. “I call her my wife, but we’re not legally married. Her name’s Nikki, she’s beautiful. We spent so much time in the cell holding each other,” Richardson says, referring to Wallace.
In the video Richardson explains how he met Wallace after having been previously in a sexual relationship with the president of the Sureños, also known as the Sur 13 gang. Referring to Wallace with feminine pronouns, Richardson says, “She ended up moving in to the cell with me… The first night she moved in, I was like, ‘Want me to suck your d**k?’”
Richardson has made multiple images using AI generators, including images which imagine himself and Wallace with two young sons.
The 2023 ACLU lawsuit advocating for Richardson’s requested surgeries was successful the following year, when the United States District Court of Indiana ruled that Richardson had been subjected to “cruel and unusual punishment” by being denied the various plastic surgeries he had demanded.
The ruling issued by Judge Richard Young in September 2024 has far-reaching implications and sets a precedent for further surgeries and hormones to be doled out at taxpayers’ expense. The verdict declared that the statute added to Indiana’s legal code in 2023 barring the DOC from facilitating “medically necessary gender-affirming” surgeries for inmates qualifies as “sex discrimination.”
The mother of the baby girl Richardson strangled to death opposed his legal bid to obtain surgery. Linda Thomas submitted a brief statement expressing her concern that his identity may be concealed from her when he is released from prison.
“On the day he murdered my child, I personally observed Plaintiff with a fresh bleeding tattoo of my child’s name on his arm while I was at the hospital that evening,” Thomas said. “I live in fear for myself and my children of the day [Richardson] is released from prison, which largely increases at the thought that [his] identity may be concealed upon release.”
ACLU attorneys under the leadership of Kenneth Falk attempted to have Thomas’ testimony dismissed as court evidence on the basis that “Ms. Cordellioné objected to the relevance of this declaration.”
Originally written for and published by Reduxx, your source for pro-woman and pro-child safeguarding news.
I am deeply grateful for Genevieve Gluck. I pray for her protection and health. It has to be heinous to review the cases on which GG reports.
This is difficult to read.
How is it that solitary confinement has been deemed by courts not to be unusual punishment, though cruel, so not unconstitutional, yet:
“the total ban on gender-affirming surgery violates [his] right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment.”
is a statement by which criminals are afforded legal relief?