Jennifer Helton and Robert Norman Rivera started dating in 1996 and became engaged shortly after. Jennifer gave birth to their daughter, Katelyn Selena Rivera-Helton, on December 12, 1997. The family resided in Boothwyn, Upper Chichester Township, Pennsylvania, about 25 miles southwest of Philadelphia.
Rivera was a violent man who took pleasure in striking a woman. Jennifer has said that he hit her at least ten times when she was pregnant with Katelyn. After the child’s birth, he beat her six more times.
After another violent assault in July 1999, Jennifer and Katelyn moved into her parents’ home, and she obtained a Protection From Abuse order and granted her sole custody of Katelyn. Rivera was allowed to have one supervised visit a week. Later that month, Jennifer returned to the apartment she shared with Rivera to get a few things, and Rivera attacked her again. Jennifer filed charges against him, and police charged him with assault but did not take him into custody at that point.
Where is Katelyn Rivera-Helton?
As Jennifer settled into her new life with her daughter, she never could have imagined a tragedy so horrible it would change her entire life forever.
On August 10, 1999, Jennifer and her aunt had stopped at a Wawa convenience store in Upper Chichester. In the parking lot, Rivera approached their vehicle, grabbed Jennifer by the throat, and dragged her by her hair through the parking lot after she refused to speak to him after a court hearing that morning.
Jennifer later testified: “I was afraid for my life. I thought then that he was going to kill me.”
A passer-by intervened, and Rivera sped from the parking lot. Jennifer knew he would get Katelyn at a private daycare nearby. She asked relatives to go to the daycare, but Rivera got there first. He forced his way in, grabbed 20-month-old Katelyn, and ran out the door.
Rivera drove around with Katelyn for several hours and placed a series of calls to Jennifer, demanding her to meet with him. He told her that if she refused, she would never see Katelyn again.
Rivera was supposed to have lunch with his girlfriend, Michelle Lupi, that day, but he showed up at 5:20 p.m. in Lupi’s car with Katelyn in tow.
Lupi entered the vehicle and later said Rivera was hostile and driving erratically at a high rate of speed, with Katelyn in the front seat and Lupi in the back. Rivera drove from Lupi’s workplace in Essington to Interstate 95 towards Delaware. Rivera called Jennifer along the way to arrange to meet at a nearby K-mart to drop off Katelyn. However, Rivera drove on by the store, Lupi said. (Good 2004)
The trio stopped at Jennifer’s house, and Rivera shouted at Jennifer to come outside. Lupi said Jennifer told him to wait a minute, but Rivera thought she was calling the police and fled. Lupi asked Rivera to drop her off a few blocks away, and Rivera obliged.
By this time, Jennifer had already notified the police. Rivera phoned her several more times to meet but fled when he saw the police accompanying her.
He stopped at a gas station in Chadds Ford Township at 7:17 p.m. and purchased $2 worth of fuel. The gas station attendant, John McCabe, later said Katelyn was sitting in the vehicle’s front seat and she was not crying. Rivera and Katelyn left the gas station, and that was the last confirmed sighting of the toddler.
If he had driven all over the place with Katelyn, he would have needed more than $2 in gas. I want to know whether this was for his vehicle or filled in a gas can.
Rivera returned to the gas station two hours later without Katelyn and used the restroom. He bought $10 more in gas by bartering his watch to McCabe and identified himself as Rob. He told McCabe he would return later for the watch and pay back the $10.
Less than two hours later, Rivera drove to the rural Maryland home of his friend, Thomas Whittaker, and the men drank together in Whittaker’s boathouse. Rivera asked Whittaker if he could spend the night, and Whittaker agreed, letting Rivera sleep on his couch. Rivera left abruptly in the morning without speaking to Whittaker, who later noticed that his boathouse door was open and went to investigate. He kept all his tools in the boathouse and realized his spade shovel was missing.
Meanwhile, Rivera called Jennifer again. He told her that he gave Katelyn to a woman who lost her baby and said that their daughter was “in a better place.” He offered to take Jennifer to Katelyn but became angry when she again contacted the police.
Robert Rivera’s Arrest
Police apprehended Rivera as he drove away from Jennifer’s family home (Commonwealth v. Rivera 2003) on August 11, 1999, one day after he took Katelyn. He told the police the same story he told Jennifer – that he gave Kately to a woman but would not elaborate, so they allowed him to meet with Jennifer.
Rivera still refused to say where Katelyn was and told her she would never see the child again.
Rivera told inmate William Lively a different story and said that the Longwood Gardens version never happened and he gave Katelyn to someone he trusted. He later told Lively that he suffocated Katelyn and removed her clothes to make it difficult to identify her and to ensure that her body decayed quickly. Rivera disposed of Katelyn’s clothes on Route 202 and used Whittaker’s shovel to dig the hole in which he buried Katelyn’s body. Rivera said he left the shovel at a construction site near Whittaker’s property and drew a map for Lively showing the location of Katelyn’s body. He wanted Lively to lie by informing his lawyer that Whittaker had committed the crime. (Commonwealth v. Rivera 2003)
However, Lively reported the information to the police. Investigators searched the construction site and the nearby Elk River for evidence but found nothing.
In a September 1999 prison interview, Rivera claimed he took Katelyn on a daylong trip around the region, including two meals at McDonald’s and a visit to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. At Longwood Gardens, he met a young couple who sympathized with him and took the child without telling him their names or where they lived.” Rivera said he gave Katelyn away because he did not trust Jennifer to care for her. He also said he never asked the stranger’s names because he was worried police would pry them for information about Katelyn’s whereabouts. (Stoll 1999)
In a September 23 letter to the Delco Times, Rivera wrote that only he and God knew his daughter’s whereabouts. Police searched extensively for Katelyn but never found her.
Charged with Murder
Investigators charged Rivera with murder and kidnapping in March 2000. Later that year, Jennifer testified at a pretrial hearing in Delaware County Court. By then, Rivera had called her 44 times and sent numerous cards to her and Katelyn but refused to tell her where their daughter was.
“He asked me to marry him in jail,” Helton testified. But she told him, “there’s no family without Katelyn.” He responded, “when he got out of jail, we’d both go and get Katelyn and we’d be a family.” Rivera wanted her to hug and kiss him at the station, and she did it, but he refused to tell her where Katelyn was, saying he gave her to a woman in upstate NY who had lost a baby. He later told her that the story was a lie.
Trial
Rivera’s trial started in January 2002. According to The Charley Project, the prosecution stated that Rivera’s story of what happened to Katelyn changed about 30 times, and he said he took Katelyn away to protect her but gave no evidence to support his statements.
Rivera took the stand in his defense and stated that while he was physically abusive to Jennifer, he never harmed Katelyn. He still refused to divulge Katelyn’s whereabouts but maintained he did not kill her.
Jennifer again testified, as did Lively and inmate Vincent Card, who testified he had a conversation with Rivera in the county prison law library in April 2000. Rivera told him, “I lost it. I did it. I killed Katelyn.”
The jury found Rivera guilty of second-degree murder, kidnapping, burglary, and interference with custody. A judge sentenced him to life in prison. He appealed his sentence in 2003, but the court denied it. He is currently incarcerated at SCI Phoenix in Collegeville, PA.
Aftermath
A few months after the trial, Jennifer had Katelyn legally declared dead. By August 2003, she had received her paralegal degree, was working towards a Bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice, and started a foundation in her daughter’s honor called HOPE – Help Others Prosper and Encourage.
In 2007, she gave birth to her second child, Tyler Helton. Jennifer told him about his sister when he was old enough to understand.
Jennifer was in a relationship a few years ago. She told the Delco Times in 2019: “He makes me laugh and he makes me feel safe. He treats me like a queen.”
On a generic-looking website, a person claiming to be Rivera posted several garbage entries in which he threw around all kinds of BS. Mostly, he blames Jennifer for everything and attempts to put her in a bad light.
Brief Thoughts
As a woman who dealt with an abusive ex-husband who constantly threatened to kidnap our children, I can only hope that life in prison for Rivera has been challenging, to put it nicely. He needs to tell Jennifer where Katelyn is because he’s already serving life in prison. He’s not going to lose anything. I think the reason he remains silent is because he likes the fact that he knows where Katelyn is and Jennifer doesn’t. He’s still playing a cat-and-mouse game.
If you are someone you know is a victim of domestic violence, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-7233 or dial 911 for local authorities. Help is only a phone call away.
Sources
Associated Press. “Search Ends in Md. For 20-month-old Girl.” The Philadelphia Inquirer, August 20, 1999.
Good, Meaghan. “Katelyn Selena Rivera-Helton.” The Charley Project. https://charleyproject.org/case/katelyn-selena-rivera-helton
Janco, Mary Anne. “Daughter’s Memory Lives by Helping Abuse Victims.” The Philadelphia Inquirer, August 3, 2003.
Janco, Mary Anne. “Informant: Man Said He Killed Baby.” The Philadelphia Inquirer, May 18, 2001.
Janco, Mary Anne. “Mother Testifies in Murder Case. The Philadelphia Inquirer, September 15, 2000.
Janco, Mary Anne. “Woman Recounts Calls About Baby.” The Philadelphia Inquirer, January 16, 2002.
“Katelyn’s Legacy; 2 Decades Later, Images of a Toddler Snatched & Killed.” The Delco Times, June 30, 2019. https://www.delcotimes.com/2019/06/30/katelyns-legacy-2-decades-later-images-of-a-toddler-snatched-killed/
Stoll, Michael. “Discovery Casts Doubt on Father’s Story About 2-Year-Old’s Fate.” The Philadelphia Inquirer, October 16, 1999.
Stoll, Michael. “Father Charged With Murder.” The Philadelphia Inquirer, March 23, 2000.
Stoll, Michael. “Trial Set For Man in Death of Child.” The Philadelphia Inquirer, March 29, 2000.
