PORT ANGELES — A plea agreement under which teen Lauryn Last, who is accused of killing her newborn son, would not receive any jail time remained in limbo Wednesday while another delay occurred in the murder case’s lengthy court proceedings.
A key Clallam County Superior Court hearing on the admissibility of statements that the Port Angeles teen, now 17, made to police about the December 2008 death of her newborn son had originally been scheduled for Wednesday.
But it was postponed so that Suzanne and John Hayden, representing Last, could better prepare for the case, John Hayden said Wednesday.
A new date for the hearing for Last, who is being tried as an adult, is expected to be set at 9 a.m. Friday during a status hearing on the case.
The Haydens recently returned from Africa on private business, John Hayden said Wednesday.
“We’re not ready yet,” he said.
Police say Last drowned her newborn son in a toilet just after he was born, when she was 16.
They say she put the corpse in a garbage bag and deposited it in a trash container in the alley of her Port Angeles home. The body was found in a 30-ton trash container near Tacoma, where the garbage had been shipped.
Last’s trial is scheduled to begin June 7.
Previous trial dates were set for Jan. 25 this year and Nov. 16, Sept. 24, April 20 and March 2, 2009.
The Clallam County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office first charged Last with first-degree murder with an alternative of second-degree murder, then dropped the first-degree murder charge.
Last pleaded not guilty to both charges.
The first-degree murder charge would have carried a possible 27-year sentence.
A second-degree murder charge carries a maximum sentence of 181âÑ3 years.
Plea agreement offer
Under the March 4 plea agreement offered by the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, the case would be transferred to county Juvenile Court, where Last would plead guilty to first-degree manslaughter and be sentenced to 15 to 36 weeks in prison.
Last has until May 3 to make a decision on the agreement. If she accepts it, she would receive credit for time served, which would keep her out of jail.
“If she took the offer, she’d be done,” county Deputy Prosecuting Attorney John Troberg said Wednesday.
Last would still have a criminal record and would be on probation until she turns 18, Troberg said, adding that she also would be responsible for court-related financial penalties.
Troberg would not comment about why the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office moved from seeking a sentence of up to 27 years to one in which Last would not serve any prison time at all.
“While there are certainly very good reasons for the offer that was made, I really am not free to discuss them at this point” while the case is awaiting trial, he said, acknowledging the change in approach poses “a major question.”
Nor would Hayden comment on why he has not responded to a plea offer more than 5 weeks old.
“It would not be appropriate,” he said.
Was in shock
Suzanne Hayden has said that Last did not know she was in labor and went into shock when she gave birth while sitting on a toilet.
The infant was full-term and died by drowning, according to an autopsy.
Port Angeles Police Detective Jesse Winfield’s statement, contained in court records is that Last “put her baby face-down into a toilet and allowed it to drown for several minutes until it died.
“She then threw her son into the trash can outside in a plastic garbage bag.”
After spending eight months in juvenile detention, Last was released in January on her own recognizance — but on nightly curfew — to live with her grandmother and an uncle.
Last had recently moved from Colorado to Port Angeles when the baby was born and died.
The baby’s father, Gregory Greenway, 37, of Pueblo, Colo., is serving four years in prison for criminal attempt to commit sexual assault on a child for assaulting Last in 2008, when Last was 15.
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Staff writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-417-3536 or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
