A devastating case out of Douglas County is leaving many in the Roseburg community struggling to process what happened this week. According to the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office, a 27-year-old man is now in custody after admitting to killing his 11-month-old son. The child’s body was later recovered from the South Umpqua River.
Deputies were first called Sunday to the Relax Inn in Sutherlin after a report of a missing child. When they arrived, they spoke with the boy’s father, identified as Jared Scott Jeremy Stoller, who told authorities his infant son, Jaxson, had disappeared from the hotel room. What initially appeared to be a search for a missing child quickly shifted in a far more tragic direction.
Following further interviews, investigators say Stoller confessed that his son had not gone missing. Instead, he admitted to killing the child days earlier in Roseburg and disposing of the body in the South Umpqua River.
Search efforts then turned to the river, where divers with the sheriff’s office later located the infant’s body near the 3500 block of Old Melrose Road. The discovery brought a heartbreaking end to what had briefly been treated as a missing child case. The South Umpqua River, a familiar and peaceful part of the landscape for many locals, became the site of a tragedy no community ever wants to face.
Stoller is currently being held at the Douglas County Jail and faces charges of first-degree murder and abuse of a corpse. Authorities say he has no prior criminal history in Oregon. He is expected to make his first court appearance this week, though investigators have not yet released additional details about what led up to the child’s death.
For many in Roseburg, the weight of this case is hard to put into words. It’s the kind of news that stops you for a moment, especially in a place where families build their lives around the same streets, parks, and riverbanks now tied to this tragedy. A young life has been lost, and a community is left trying to understand how something like this could happen. As the investigation continues, officials say more information may be released, but for now, the focus remains on the case and the difficult reality it has left behind.
