A New York woman who admitted to smothering her 4-year-old son during a bitter custody battle more than a decade ago has been found dead in prison.

Manuela Morgado, who was serving a sentence of 20 years to life for the killing of her young son, was discovered dead in her cell at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility on Wednesday, March 4.

According to the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, Morgado was found unresponsive around 2 a.m. Her death is now under investigation.

A record confirming Morgado’s death has been posted on the state corrections department’s website.

Morgado had been incarcerated since pleading guilty in 2014 to second-degree murder in the death of her son, Jason “Jake” Reish.

The tragic case shocked New York when it first unfolded in October 2012.

According to reports at the time, Morgado drugged the child with Benadryl before smothering him with a pillow inside their home.

Authorities said the killing was carried out during a tense custody dispute between Morgado and her ex-fiancé.

After killing her son, Morgado reportedly attempted to take her own life.

Investigators said she swallowed a large amount of Xanax and left behind a note before being discovered and hospitalized.

When later questioned by police, Morgado reportedly claimed she believed the killing would allow her and her son to be together forever.

According to reporting by The Journal News, she told investigators that she intended Jake’s death to be “quick and peaceful so we could be happy together forever.”

The disturbing statement added to the horror of a crime that prosecutors described as deliberate and carefully planned.

At Morgado’s sentencing in 2014, then–Westchester County District Attorney Janet DiFiore condemned the killing in stark terms.

“This defendant methodically planned and carried out the murder of her four-year-old child,” DiFiore said.

“A child whose life was taken well before his time by the very person whose job it was to protect him.”

The case drew intense attention in part because of the custody fight surrounding Jake at the time of his death.

Court proceedings revealed that Morgado and her former fiancé had been locked in a dispute over the young boy’s future when the killing occurred.

Prosecutors argued that Morgado carried out the murder as the legal battle intensified.

She ultimately pleaded guilty to second-degree murder rather than face a trial that could have led to a longer sentence.

For more than a decade, Morgado remained incarcerated at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, New York’s maximum-security prison for women.

Officials have not yet released details about how she died.

As standard procedure, the death is being investigated by prison authorities.