A 16-year-old girl in Nebraska will not be spending any time behind bars after she threw her newborn baby out of a second-story window in September of 2016.
Antonia Lopez gave birth on September 30 last year in her apartment in Omaha, Nebraska. Lopez apparently believed the baby to be stillborn, so she threw it out of her window. After throwing the baby out of the window, she contacted her mother to tell her what happened. The baby died due to injuries sustained from the fall.
Lopez was originally charged as an adult, facing 20 years in prison for child abuse resulting in death, but the case was sent to juvenile court in February 2017. It was there that Douglas County Juvenile Court Judge Christopher Kelly decided to keep Lopez out of jail, instead ordering her to be placed on probation. She is also required to live in a group home, go through therapy, delete her Facebook account, and serve 50 hours of community service. Her Facebook account was ordered to be deleted because of incendiary comments and harassment she was receiving.
The prosecution asked that she be sent to a group home partially because they felt that Lopez didn’t understand the severity of her actions, something Lopez’s defense attorney Rebecca McClung denies. “To say she doesn’t understand is disingenuous,” McClung said. “She understands.” McClung also said that Lopez, as well as her mother and grandmother, are coping the best they can.
Lopez will remain in jail until a group home is found, but officials have had a hard time finding a group home willing to take her in as she is seen as a risk. Her probation is also open-ended, which means the judge could decide that it will last until she turns 19 at the latest.