Guilty Plea In Meth Breast Milk Death; California Mom Maggie Wortman Gets Manslaughter

EUREKA, Calif. -- A California woman accused of killing her infant son by breastfeeding him after she used methamphetamine has pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter.

An autopsy on 6-week-old Michael Acosta III found that the infant died of "methamphetamine toxicity" on Nov. 21, 2010.

Prosecutors initially tried to charge Wortman with murder, saying she should have known the dangers of breastfeeding after smoking the drug. But a judge threw out the charge, saying there was insufficient evidence to support it.

Deputy District Attorney Ben McLaughlin had said he planned to re-file the murder charge, if Wortman didn't accept the plea deal.

She faces anywhere from probation to nearly 12 years in prison when she's sentenced March 5.

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Comments

[knicole001]

04:33 PM on 02/13/2012

she's uber stupid but meth made her that way of course she didnt think something was wrong with her breast milk...smh

[scrapper7]

08:29 PM on 02/10/2012

First and foremost, Maggie Wortman desperately needs rehabilitation. Secondly, and only after qualified professionals have deemed she's clean and sober, several months of court-ordered community service performed in a hospital pediatric ward might also prove beneficial. Sometimes a slap of reality goes a long, long way.

[Pseu An]

03:22 PM on 02/10/2012

Worst case of jaundice I've ever seen.

[carnivaluv]

10:54 PM on 02/09/2012

How sad for the mom and her baby. Poor lady.

[flutterbyu]

02:01 AM on 02/10/2012

Poor Lady?! Seriously? She made a selfish choice...with total disregard to her innocent baby.
She doesn't deserve sympathy, she deserves the same death sentence she gave her child.

[Susan Shaffer]

07:56 PM on 02/11/2012

from what I understand of meth it is the first dose that is the choice and that was the bad one, after that because it is so addictive she probably had no ability to make a choice not to take it.

[Bushwhacked]

06:41 PM on 02/09/2012

Meth=Death. Don't try it. Not even once.

[TdeyoMN]

10:25 AM on 02/09/2012

She thought she had the perfect plan: Use free breast milk while spending her money on meth instead of formula...a win-win for her, but a big loss for the baby. Of course she was too high to realize what was happening and kept giving the baby the breast milk because he was up all night from the meth!

[hereisthedifference]

04:22 PM on 02/10/2012

She prob wasn't educated. As long as you're not using drugs, breast milk IS BEST for your baby. Formula is not as good ( I heard that some people even mix it with water or juice! Horrible!! Babies should not be fed juice... it rots their teeth!)

[bb bailey]

06:07 AM on 02/16/2012

You are supposed to misx formula with water, and not all juices rot childrens teeth. Even with milk/formula it is reccomended that you brush babys gums before they even have teeth. Yes, breast milk is the better of the two choices but you make it seem like its the only way and you are wrong. Alot of women can't breastfeed. So, sounds like you are a little uneducated as well.

And as for this terrible story, yea she may not have known what she was doing because she was high, but she made that choice. She was pregnant for nine months, probably went to a doctor, I am sure they offered her some sort of help so the baby didnt come out with disabilities or still orn. It's always a choice. You start you can stop, you just have to want it and she obviously is selfish and didnt care about that poor child.

[mdipary2004]

08:15 AM on 02/09/2012

What else is new. Mothers kill and abuse their children all the time and allways recieve a light sentence or a lesser charge.

[BatChanah]

01:36 AM on 02/09/2012

Abortion shouldn't be under the guise of "reproduction right!" they have reproduced already, abortion is murder, the killing of a human being, and no, that is not a blob or some tissues...At 16 days of gestation the baby's heart is already pumping it's own blood...The spinal cord can by seen, and the nervous system is working, although they are less than one inch long, they DO feel pain. These days with our technology, it is very rare for a Mom to be in physical danger....Children can born earlier if necessary, one of my triplets weighted 2.2 ounces at birth, he went down to 1.7 ounces, of course they were born 5 weeks before their DOB.....that was 29 years ago. and today they are strong hansome young guys. For me, abortion is akin to murder, it destroys more than a human being, it is very violent to the woman's body! In the end of the ninth month, the mother to be, start producing hormones that will start labor, for abortion, it is not produced! it is brough on violently, and we don't know the longtime side effect....Many young women have no idea how their own bodies truly works, we are far more complex than our males contrepart. This is my humble opinion, and, as we all know, everyone has theirs.

[ReDaRa]

09:42 AM on 02/09/2012

Pregnancy and labor can also destroy a woman's body and can possibly kill you! You do not have the right to make me have a child I do not want. It is not your body and it is not your life that is afected by the birth and life of this child. Unless you are going to give me child support for having this child I did not want, leave me be. Like I've said in previous post, you are all about pro-life while the child's in the womb, but when the child is actually born, people like you disappear. It is a fetus, yes it has a heartbeat after a few weeks, but it cannot live outside of the female's body. They actually call that a parasite ( an organism that feeds off another organism to live). And yes I do have a child whom I love more than anything, but who am I to try and make someone else have a child when I am not going to help to support that child?

[OkaliyDokaliy]

12:50 PM on 02/10/2012

Even though you have had children, you obviously don't know how bodies work or how abortions are performed. I have never had an abortion but I would never stop a woman from getting an abortion. What most people don't realize is that the mental stable and capable women who can afford to care for the children and have plenty of love for them, DO NOT DO the abortions. However, women and young teen girls, who are mentally and financially incapable of caring for children DO abortions.

[Iron100]

01:23 AM on 02/09/2012

california is full of druggies. I just moved here from the east coast and i see druggies smoking on the street openly.

[Ramiro Guzman]

12:56 AM on 02/09/2012

...Poor lady my &^^* ...Life gives us signs to right our wrongs. This innocent child was a way to show this addict the light and align her life. If an innocent baby is not enough to inspire her to think and act as a responsible adult and put the childs welfare and well being above her selfish needs, I cannot feel sorry for her. Drug addiction is very hard, but there are things that should make us stop and think our priorities and overcome our weaknesses..in this case the life of a little angel. She just blew her chance of ever deserving my or anybody's sympathy.

[carnivaluv]

10:43 PM on 02/09/2012

"She just blew her chance of ever deserving my or anybody's sympathy."

Speak only for yourself. She has mine.

[RCnDC]

11:08 PM on 02/08/2012

How very tragic..... But remember, the radical GOTP baggers claim that the GLBT community, the ones who are not allowed to marry or adopt children, is the threat to family, children and institution of marriage.. I would do anything to be able to raise a child.. It's an enormous and painful void in my life. My partner of 18yrs and I are not allowed to even adopt or foster unwanted or abused children in Virginia..

[hereisthedifference]

04:26 PM on 02/10/2012

It is devastating how the US gov (and many other govs) do not give incentives for people to adopt. You can have five kids as a single mother no problem, but if you want to adopt one child and you have none, you go through hell. Those kids deserve wanting parents!

[Susan Shaffer]

08:03 PM on 02/11/2012

can you move state?

[Cody Wandel]

07:30 PM on 02/08/2012

Make our town proud. Tweakerville, CA

[rockysparks]

03:39 PM on 02/08/2012

The headline writers must have leaped at a chance to use all those M-words:

Meth. Mom. Maggie. Milk. Manslaughter. Murder. Michael ...

[SupremeDNA]

04:15 PM on 02/08/2012

Hey Rocky!How you been?

[offcenterlevi]

01:58 PM on 02/08/2012

Sad story, but ignorant drug addicts tend not to know any better. How about a little more education?

[Ray Russelburg]

02:07 PM on 02/08/2012

Heaven forbid a truly good mother have a nursing station...

Don't punish the good because of the actions of the bad.

[masmanz]

02:25 PM on 02/08/2012

Just because one baby died you want to deprive all the babies of the breast milk?