PORT ANGELES — A mental health evaluation for a teenager accused as an adult of drowning her newborn infant was set to take place Wednesday and a court hearing is scheduled for July 16 to hear the results.
Clallam County prosecutors want her formally evaluated to determine her mental state at the time of the baby’s death and when she spoke with Port Angeles police officers about it.
Lauryn L. Last, now 17, was charged in January 2009 with first-degree murder — a charge the county Prosecuting Attorney’s Office later got reduced to second-degree murder, the maximum sentence for which is 18 years and four months.
Last’s trial had been set for June 7, but all court proceedings were halted last month when prosecutors learned that she had a mental health evaluation in preparation for a hearing to determine whether she was mentally capable of making statements to police in 2009 about how her baby drowned the night it was born, according to court records.
Last is now living with a relative on her own recognizance.
The infant was full-term and died by drowning, according to an autopsy.
The infant’s body was placed in an alley trash can, later taken to the city’s waste transfer station and shipped to a waste station in Tacoma.
There investigators found the body in a 30-ton trash container.
Last’s mental evaluation will determine if she was capable of understanding her rights to be silent and to an attorney when she was interrogated by police in January 2009.
