Mom Who Smothered Baby While in Drug-Induced Sleep Pleads Guilty: 'I Carry the Ultimate Punishment'
A mother whose 6-month-old baby died beneath her on an air mattress pleaded with a judge for leniency in an upstate New York court last week.
A mother who rolled over and asphyxiated her baby while sleeping from a mix of marijuana and prescription medications pleaded guilty and asked for leniency in a New York State court last week.
"I carry the ultimate punishment," Danielle Lefay said in a Broome County court Friday. "I am deeply sorry for being the one to neglectfully... take her last breath."
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The previous January, Lefay, 41, was sleeping on an improperly inflated air mattress beside her 6-month-old daughter Vianna when it collapsed as the two slept.
Vianna was smothered to death. In March, a grand jury indicted Lefay for felony counts of second-degree manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide.
Lefay's roommates found the little girl unresponsive in the apartment the next day. Paramedics responded and administered CPR, but Vianna was pronounced dead at a hospital.
Last week, Lefay admitted that a combination of her drug use and lack of understanding of the risks she was posing to the baby resulted in the girl's death.
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Lefay's plea agreement allows the judge to impose jail time served, probation, or up to three years in state prison, according to the Press & Sun Bulletin.
Lefay's sentencing hearing is scheduled for January 20.
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