SAN DIEGO (CNS) - The parents of a 3- month-old girl who starved to death in San Diego were each sentenced today to 15 years to life in state prison.
Brandon Copeland, 25, and Elizabeth Reneedawn Ucman, 26, were convicted by separate San Diego 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.
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.
San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan said in a statement released after the sentencing hearing, ``Baby Delilah entered this world healthy and full of promise, and within three months she died of starvation at the hands of her parents.''
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 were " 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.
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