Inset: Kylen George Johnson Allen (Hennepin County Jail). Background: The area in Minnesota where Allen's newborn died last year (Google Maps).
A 20-year-old man in Minnesota will avoid prison despite being convicted in the November 2025 death of his newborn, whom he left propped up on a pillow with a bottle so he could run an "errand."
Hennepin County District Judge Marta M. Chou on Tuesday sentenced Kylen George Johnson Allen to four years in prison but stayed that sentence for five years, on the condition that he serve 180 days in the Hennepin County workhouse, a short-term correctional and residential facility that provides work training and rehabilitation services, followed by five years of supervised probation, court records show.
The sentence was handed down after Allen was convicted on one count of second-degree manslaughter in his son's death.
According to a probable cause affidavit, officers responded on Nov. 1, 2025, to a report of a 9-day-old boy who was "gasping and unconscious" at a residence in the 2600 block of Golden Valley Road in Minneapolis.
When police arrived, the child was already in an ambulance.
Allen, the father, initially told officers he had left the baby "with a neighbor who was friends with his mother" while he "ran an errand" on the south side of Minneapolis. Allen said that when he returned, he noticed a mark on the infant's lip and that the baby was breathing slowly.
"When he noticed the victim acting strangely, [Allen] reported he called 911," the affidavit states.
The baby was transported to a hospital in full cardiac arrest, where he was pronounced dead. Medical personnel said he was pale and cold when he arrived, "so it was believed he had been deceased for some time prior to arrival."
Doctors also said that formula or breast milk had to be suctioned from the newborn's mouth and throat.
At the hospital, Allen and the infant's mother were observed "going into the bathroom together for an extended and abnormal period."
Investigators obtained surveillance footage from outside Allen's home showing that he did not leave the baby with a neighbor, as he had claimed.
In an interview with police, the mother initially gave investigators a false account, according to the affidavit.
"Later in the interview, when confronted with inconsistent surveillance footage, [the mother] admitted she was not being truthful and told the investigator that Defendant told her what to say to police," the affidavit states.
Allen initially repeated his account during an interview with investigators. After being confronted with the surveillance footage, he admitted he had lied.
From the affidavit:
Defendant admitted to propping Victim in a U-shaped neck pillow with a bottle and wrapping a towel around Victim's head to hold the bottle in place during Victim's 3 a.m. feeding. Defendant then reported falling asleep in another room for several hours. When Defendant returned to find Victim, Victim was face down in the neck pillow and had a red mark on his face. Defendant reported when he picked Victim up, Victim was breathing abnormally so he called 911.
An autopsy was performed at the Hennepin County Medical Examiner's Office. The medical examiner classified the cause of death as undetermined but could not rule out positional asphyxiation, a finding consistent with Allen's account of how he left the infant.