Woman Charged With Death of Baby in Toilet

A farm worker accused of throwing two of her newborn babies down the toilet in the last 18 months was charged Monday by the Ventura County district attorney’s office with one count of murder and another of attempted murder.

Maria Francisca Jimenez Sanchez is accused of drowning her newborn baby last November in a portable toilet near a Saticoy onion field where she was working at the time of the infant’s death.

Jimenez was also charged with attempted murder for allegedly trying to flush another newborn down another toilet in May, 1990.

Jimenez, who was arrested Saturday at an Oxnard home, declined to enter a plea on either count at a hearing Monday. Brian Fitzpatrick, the public defender assigned to Jimenez, asked Judge John R. Smiley to postpone her arraignment.

Fitzpatrick said he had not had enough time to review the case and declined to comment further. The judge set a new arraignment date for Monday.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Carol J. Nelson said Jimenez gave birth inside the latrine in Saticoy on July 28 and then dropped the baby into the toilet. The body of the baby was discovered that night by a maintenance worker who was cleaning the toilet, Ventura County sheriff’s investigators said.

The county coroner’s office determined that the baby was alive at birth and drowned in the toilet’s chemicals and fecal matter.

“That baby only lived two minutes but he suffered more than most of us suffer in a lifetime,” Nelson said.

Jimenez tried to flush another baby down a toilet at her Oxnard home after giving birth May 11, 1990, Nelson said. That child, Jose Luis Sanchez, was saved by a neighbor who heard him cry, but suffered permanent brain damage from being kept underwater in the toilet, Nelson said. The child is in a foster care home, she said.

Nelson said Jimenez has given few details about her life. Even Jimenez’s age is a matter of dispute, Nelson said, because she has written in some labor contracts that she is 21 and in others that she is 23.

Jimenez told investigators that the fathers of Jose Luis Sanchez and the dead infant--known as Baby Boy Sanchez--live somewhere in Mexico, Nelson said.

Nelson said she believes that Jimenez is an illegal immigrant. She said she has been unable to determine Jimenez’s hometown in Mexico.

“It depends on what story you believe,” Nelson said. “She has several different versions. She’s very vague about where she came from or any specifics about the babies’ fathers.”

Assistant Public Defender Duane Dammeyer said he believes Jimenez is illiterate. “She’s signed several forms with an X ,” he said.

During Monday’s hearing, Fitzpatrick and a court translator spent several minutes explaining to Jimenez that her arraignment was being postponed.

She sat stone-faced in the far corner of the defendants box next to the bailiff, separating herself from the other defendants, who chatted among themselves. Throughout the hearing, Jimenez stared at the wall across the courtroom, avoiding eye contact with others.

Baby Boy Sanchez was buried Aug. 13 at Ivy Lawn Park in Ventura after a funeral service, performed by a Los Angeles minister, that no one attended. A few days later, three residents who read about the burial bought a headstone for the baby’s grave.