'Mommy' who suffocated newborn gets 4 months probation

On June 2, 2003, 19-year-old Jennifer Sotomayor of Streamwood, Ill., gave birth to a full-term, healthy baby girl in her parents' bathroom.

Unbelievably, Sotomayor had hidden her pregnancy from all but the baby's 29-year-old father, Steven Lemery, and an ex-boyfriend.

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Sotomayor's attorneys later said her plan was to deliver her baby in secret and legally abandon her at a neighborhood firehouse according to Illinois' safe haven law. Sotomayor said although she took "great joy" at the prospect of becoming a "mommy," she was also fearful because she had just started college.

But Sotomayor did not respond to the birth of her daughter like a typical "mommy."

First, "mommy" delivered her baby into a toilet. Not only that, she left the baby partially submerged in toilet water while severing the umbilical cord with her bare hands.

Then, when Sotomayor's father knocked on the bathroom door because he heard a ruckus, Sotomayor cupped her hand over her baby's mouth to keep her from crying, still submerged.

Two minutes later, after Sotomayor's father walked away, Sotomayor took her hand off the baby's mouth and finally took her from the toilet and to the sink. It was then Sotomayor said she realized the infant was dead.

Washing her off, Sotomayor put both baby and placenta into a shoebox and hid it under her bed. She later said she stroked her dead baby's cheek and named her Crystal Gray.

Sotomayor's mother discovered the baby's body 14 hours later and took Sotomayor and the baby to the hospital. The hospital contacted police.

A medical examiner determined the baby's death was homicide by asphyxiation, testifying she found the lungs expanded. An ER doctor who assessed the baby also testified she was born alive. A radiologist testified that x-rays showed air in the baby's lungs and stomach.

Sotomayor was charged with first degree murder and concealing a homicide. For these charges she could have received life in prison.

Judge John Scotillo agreed the baby died of asphyxiation, but said prosecutors didn't prove Sotomayor intended to kill her.

So, on Nov. 17, 2004, Scotillo convicted Sotomayor of involuntary manslaughter and also found her not guilty of concealing a homicide. Still, for that crime Sotomayor could have gotten 14 years in prison. But last month, Scotillo handed down Sotomayor's sentence – four years probation.

Scotillo explained "no purpose would be served" by sending Sotomayor to prison, although he expressed concern for her "double set of values." (Sotomayor's mother testified she was known as the family's "official bug catcher" for rescuing insects from being swatted or squashed and releasing them.)

Double set of values?

For the second time in less than a year, an Illinois court has refused to convict a mother for murdering her newborn, and I don't think it's coincidence. I think it's a trend. The trend is not merely devaluing newborn babies' lives, but specifically the lives of newborn babies killed by their mothers.

In fact, Sotomayor's attorneys hearkened back to the Elizabeth Ehlert case in her defense. Last summer, the Illinois Supreme Court upheld an appellate court's decision to overturn Ehlert's two-time murder conviction in the 1990 killing of her newborn baby. Ehlert also delivered a daughter, alone, and smothered her. But Ehlert was eventually let off because the prosecution could not prove her baby was completely separated from her when killed.

Double set of values?

Since 1973, American courts have bent over backward to legally sanction a mother's right to kill her preborn child up to and during delivery. Meanwhile, they nail anyone else committing the same crime.

Pro-aborts have told mothers to repress maternal instincts even animals have to protect and nurture their young, and to go one step further and kill them. Meanwhile, fathers are nailed who abandon children mothers have permitted to live.

Well meaning pro-lifers haven't helped by sympathizing with post-abortive women to such an extent as to participate in the lie that they didn't understand what they were doing when deep inside they did. There is only one way to get over abortion, and it is not by excusing it. It is by confessing one's sin, repenting, accepting the forgiveness Jesus Christ offers, and doing one's best to right this great wrong.

Double set of values?

It is not difficult to see how a judicial system that sanctions a mother's right to kill her baby pre-delivery would eventually begin bending the rules for a few minutes post-delivery as well.

Watch as the minutes tick to hours, then days, then ...