PORT ANGELES — Lauryn Louise Last, 19 now but 16 when charged as an adult with murdering her newborn son, has accepted a plea offer under which her case would be transferred to juvenile court and she would not be incarcerated, Clallam County Deputy Prosecuting Attorney John Troberg said Friday.
Judge Ken Williams will rule on the proposed plea agreement at a 1 p.m. hearing Wednesday in Clallam County Superior Court at the county courthouse, 223 E. Fourth St. in Port Angeles.
“I’m not asking for any more detention time other than what she’s already done,” Troberg said.
Under the plea deal, Last would plead guilty to a reduced charge of second-degree manslaughter in juvenile court, Troberg said, and would face up to 30 days incarceration when sentenced for second-degree manslaughter as a juvenile, Troberg said.
Last, who is now on her own recognizance and living with a family member, already had served nine months in juvenile detention and would get credit for time served, Troberg said.
No comment
Last’s attorney, John Hayden of Clallam County Public Defenders, would not comment on Wednesday’s hearing.
“I have no comment at this point,” Hayden said last week.
But Troberg said the two had come to an agreement.
“[Hayden] has accepted the plea offer,” Troberg said.
“It’s basically going back to an offer that was made a couple of years ago.”
Williams was scheduled to rule on the plea agreement Friday, but Hayden was short-staffed due to inclement weather, Hayden said.
Last is accused of drowning her newborn son in a toilet Dec. 30, 2008, immediately after his birth.
She told police she let him drown, according to a transcript of her confession.
Last has been scheduled to stand trial for second-degree murder March 12 and has pleaded not guilty.
The admissibility of her January 2009 confession to police was key to Wednesday’s proceedings, Troberg said.
Troberg said he and Hayden began discussing the plea deal after Williams ruled against Hayden in September concerning statements Last made to police in January 2009.
In the statement, Last first told police she tried to revive the infant with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation before saying she intentionally let the infant die in a toilet at the Port Angeles home of her father, Ron Last, according to a transcript of the confession.
Williams ruled Lauryn Last was not coerced into making the confession and allowed her admission to be included as evidence at her trial.
Last’s trial had been repeatedly delayed by 11 months of hearings to determine the admissibility the confession.
Last was 16 in 2009 when she was charged, as an adult, with first-degree murder, for which she could have been sentenced to up to 27 years.
The charge was reduced to second-degree murder in 2009 because there was no sign of premeditation, Troberg said in an earlier interview.
If convicted of second-degree murder, she could have been sentenced to up to 18 years.
The juvenile court proceedings under which she would receive no time in juvenile detention will be public, Troberg said, but the record of the proceedings can be sealed after two years.
Last was 15 and living in Colorado when she was impregnated by a 37-year-old man who was a friend of a relative’s, according to court records.
Gregory Greenway is serving a four-year sentence in Colorado for criminal attempt to commit sexual assault on a child.
“I’m sorry for what I have caused you and your daughter,” he said when sentenced in 2009, addressing Last’s mother, Dawn Harris, according to the Pueblo (Colo.) Chieftan.
“I’m not a bad man. I just made a very bad choice.”
Police said they believe the infant Last gave birth to was full term.
The infant was dumped in a trash container and its body found in a garbage bag inside a 30-ton trash container at a Tacoma-area landfill.
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-417-3536 or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
