AUSTIN, Minn. – A man serving a life sentence for killing the mother of their 2-year-old daughter now has pleaded guilty also to killing the little girl. Dariaz Lewis Higgins, 40, was already in prison in Wisconsin for shooting and killing Sierra Robinson, the mother, five years ago Milwaukee. His daughter’s body was found in a ditch near Blooming Prairie, also in 2019, but Higgins already was in custody for the Milwaukee slaying. The Minnesota criminal complaint says that Higgins was staying at the Rodeway Inn in Austin with the little girl, Noelani Robinson, for six weeks or so in 2019 — until March 10 when he took girl’s body from the hotel and left it in a ditch north of Austin near Blooming Prairie. The next day, after the mother was murdered in Milwaukee, an Amber Alert was issued for Noelani. Her body was found five days later by a passerby. The body was wrapped in a blanket near Highway 218 and Highway 30. Austin authorities went to Milwaukee for a genetic sample from Higgins. He told them that the girl fell off the toilet and subsequently died. By his account he wrapped the body in a blanket and left her on the floor by the bed for a couple of days. Higgins said that he and a woman friend loaded up the car to drive for Minneapolis in a blizzard and left the body in the ditch. Higgins acknowledged that the girl already had been dead a few days. An autopsy determined Noelani died from blunt force trauma to the head. She also had blunt force injuries on her extremities. The woman who helped Higgins dispose of the bidy was not charged because, authorities said, she cooperated with investigators.
Higgins. Accused in child’s brutal 2019 death in Austin motel.
Noelani. Her body abandoned in a ditch durig a blizzard.