RIVERSIDE, California (AP) -- A woman accused of killing her infant son with methamphetamine-tainted breast milk lay sobbing on the floor as others cleaned up evidence of her drug use before calling 911, a witness testified in the first day of the woman's murder trial.
Amy Leanne Prien, who has three other children, has pleaded innocent in the death January 2002 death of 3-month-old Jacob Wesley Smith. She also is charged with three felony counts of child endangerment.
If convicted, she could face up to life in prison.
The Riverside County coroner originally labeled the cause of Jacob's death sudden infant death syndrome; however, a toxicology report later showed the boy had overdosed on methamphetamine, a highly addictive and illegal stimulant.
"The mother also had methamphetamine in her body, and the evidence will prove that during his very, very short lifetime, she was breast-feeding him," Deputy District Attorney Allison Nelson said in open statements Wednesday.
When Prien found her infant son not breathing, she didn't attempt to save him but instead chose to "clean things up," Nelson said.
An 18-year-old friend of Prien's daughter testified that when the death was discovered, Prien lay sobbing while a roommate hid a safe used to hold her drug supply and money. The roommate called 911 after the safe was moved, Elizabeth King said.
Prien's attorney, Stephen Yagman, didn't make an opening statement Wednesday, but he said outside court that the baby could not have died of drug-tainted breast milk because Prien used a bottle to feed her son.
"They've got no case," he said.