DAVID DISHNEAU
Associated Press
HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) — A Hagerstown woman who smothered her 2-month-old daughter by passing out drunk on top of her while breast-feeding is going to jail.
Twenty-two-year-old Yadina Morales was sentenced Tuesday to 15 months in the Washington County jail after entering an Alford plea to involuntary manslaughter. An Alford plea is not an admission of guilt but an acknowledgement that the state has enough evidence to convict.
Prosecutors agreed to drop charges including child abuse and reckless endangerment as part of the plea deal.
Morales was arrested in November after the girl’s father came home and found her passed out on top of the unresponsive girl.
Morales registered a blood-alcohol level of 0.256, more than three times the level needed for a drunken driving conviction. The judge says her actions were grossly negligent.
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