San Diego
A woman who drowned her 5-month-old daughter in San Diego Bay in 1986 was sentenced Thursday to six years in prison.
Lorenza Penguelly, 28, was given credit by San Diego Superior Court Judge Wayne Peterson for 1,226 days spent in custody since the Sept. 19, 1986, incident.
Peterson recommended to prison administrators that she be housed in a mental facility.
Several months after her arrest, a judge found her mentally incompetent to stand trial and sent her to a state mental hospital, where she had remained until last December, when officials from Patton State Hospital determined that Penguelly had regained her competence.
In February she pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter. A murder charge was then dismissed and she faced a maximum term of 11 years in prison for manslaughter.
The attorneys said Thursday that Penguelly will probably serve only 18 more months until she is released, after getting credit for good behavior.
Shortly before Penguelly threw her daughter, Sarai, into the ocean, passers-by said, she had tried to give them her baby.
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