Woman, 22, charged with murder in newborn daughter's burning

HER NAME means "angelic" and that's the most that anyone can hope for Angelica, the newborn who died after being lit afire on a Burlington County roadside.

Baby Angelica's mother, Hyphernkemberly Dorvilier, 22, appeared in Burlington County Superior Court yesterday via video monitor from prison to face murder charges, politely answering the judge's questions with a series of "Yes, your honor," but shedding no light on the crime of which she is accused.

On Friday night, Dorvilier allegedly wrapped her newborn daughter - umbilical cord and placenta still attached - in a towel and papers and set her on fire along a stretch of Simontown Road in Pemberton Township, according to an affidavit of probable cause.

When police arrived, they found the baby in the smoldering towel and Dorvilier being held down by an eyewitness, David Joseph.

Police found in her pocket a lighter and a can of flammable WD-40 spray, a lubricant used to loosen nuts and bolts. When Joseph confronted Dorvilier outside his home, she allegedly told him that she was burning dog feces. "It's not my baby," Dorvilier told Joseph after he had subdued her, according to the affidavit.

When police arrived at Dorvilier's home on Rutgers Avenue, they found a trail of blood leading into the lower portion of the split-level residence and into a bathroom, where they found a bloody rag, the document says.

Dorvilier's mother, Juana Sully, and a handful of other family members attended the brief hearing but declined to comment as they hustled toward the elevator.

Sully, according to her Facebook page, works at a church in Maryland. According to police, neither Sully nor Dorvilier's sister was aware that she had given birth.

A funeral service for Angelica Dorvilier will be held at 11 a.m. Monday at Browns Mills United Methodist Church, on Pemberton-Browns Mills Road in Browns Mills, N.J.