By Jeremy Walsh
The Bronx mother accused of smothering her infant son to death two years ago and discarding his body in Jackson Heights pleaded guilty to manslaughter last Thursday, Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said.
Lucila Rojas, 27, admitted to suffocating the child on Dec. 31, 2006, Brown said. Rojas will likely be sentenced to 15 years in prison Jan. 29, Brown said.
Rojas picked up her 2−week−old son, Anthony, from the Bronx’s Jacobi Hospital, where he was receiving treatment following his premature birth, on Dec. 31, 2006. After signing Anthony out of the hospital, Rojas placed a blanket over his face until he stopped breathing and got on a bus to Jackson Heights. She got off and dumped the infant’s body in a trash can near 100th Street and Northern Boulevard.
Rojas reported Anthony missing on Jan. 8, 2007, claiming that he had been taken from her at gunpoint while she was traveling to the hospital. She changed her story several times while talking with investigators before admitting to killing the infant.
Homicide detectives searched the Pennsylvania landfill where the area’s garbage would have been taken, but Anthony’s body was never found.
“I can think of no crime which tugs more at the heartstrings more than that of a parent who kills their own child,” Brown said in a statement. “Under the circumstances, the sentence to be imposed is more than warranted.”
Rojas told authorities the child was the result of being raped in Mexico before she fled to the United States, Brown said.
Reach reporter Jeremy Walsh by e−mail at jwalsh@timesledger.com or by phone at 718−229−0300, Ext. 154.
