The parents of a 3-month-old girl who starved to death in San Diego were each sentenced Wednesday to 15 years to life in state prison.
Read more Bernie Sanders unveils plan to give the public direct ownership of AI companies
Brandon Copeland, 25, and Elizabeth Reneedawn Ucman, 26, were convicted by separate San Diego Superior Court juries of second-degree murder in connection with the 2021 death of their daughter, Delilah.
At the time of her death, the girl weighed 3.65 pounds, less than half her weight at birth, according to prosecutors.
Copeland and Ucman, who were 21 and 22 years old at the time of the baby’s death, were arrested in November 2021 shortly after police were called to their City Heights apartment on a report that the baby was unresponsive and in need of medical attention. The child was taken to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead, and her parents were subsequently arrested.
Deputy District Attorney Franciesca Balerio told jurors that the child died due to sustained and prolonged malnutrition caused by neglect, rather than underlying medical causes.
The child was briefly removed from the couple’s home after Ucman’s aunt found their apartment in squalid conditions, with trash, moldy food, insects and pet feces strewn throughout.
Read more Federal Trade Commission sues leading transgender health group
The baby was eventually returned to the couple, at which point the prosecutor said the couple cut off all communication with family members and service providers.
“Baby Delilah entered this world healthy and full of promise and within three months she died of starvation at the hands of her parents,” District Attorney Summer Stephan said in a statement.
Defense attorneys for Copeland and Ucman told jurors their clients came from troubled upbringings that included abuse and bouts of homelessness, coupled with mental health issues that left them largely incapable of caring for themselves or a child.
Copeland’s attorney, Courtney Cutter, said the couple was “functioning at the level of children themselves” and described them as “two naive, immature, psychologically damaged adolescents who believed that they could figure out how to make themselves into parents without anybody’s help.”
Ucman’s attorney, Anthony Parker, said the couple tried to care for the child, even if their methods were ultimately insufficient. He also said postpartum depression played a role in his client’s inability to recognize how severe Delilah’s condition was.
Read more Trump has nothing but praise for Modi at G7 after tensions over US military strike, trade
