Child Freeway Death Case Dropped : Law enforcement: The mother won’t be charged. She was driving when the girl was thrown through the sunroof in an accident.

The Ventura County district attorney has decided not to prosecute a Canoga Park woman in connection with the death of her 22-month-old daughter, who died in a crash on the Ventura Freeway in September.

Toddler Melissa Perez, who was sitting on her father’s lap, was thrown through the car’s sunroof when the vehicle overturned near Santa Clara Avenue in Oxnard.

The California Highway Patrol recommended prosecution in what would have been the first case brought under a 9-year-old state law mandating that children younger than 4 be restrained in a car seat.

But prosecutors said Wednesday that Telma Ochaita was obeying the 55 m.p.h. speed limit and not driving recklessly, prompting a decision to drop the case.

“We are unable to say any act she did while driving the car caused the accident,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Kevin McGee said Wednesday. “The case is not being filed.”

Investigators still have not determined the cause of the accident, but witnesses reported no erratic driving, McGee said. It could be argued that there was a vehicle malfunction, he said.

An 11-page report filed in September by the CHP recommended that the district attorney file vehicular manslaughter and child endangerment charges.

CHP Capt. Charles Campbell, however, agreed with the decision not to prosecute, saying the family has been penalized enough with the death of their daughter.

“They’ve suffered the ultimate penalty,” Campbell said.

Melissa died Sept. 2 when the car carrying her and six others flipped on the freeway’s shoulder after moving from the middle to the right lane, the CHP report said.

She was being held by her father, Oscar Perez, 31, of Canoga Park, and was thrown through the open sunroof of the 1985 Toyota Corolla, the report said.

Neither the driver nor the other passengers were seriously hurt, but the girl was pinned under the vehicle and suffered traumatic head injuries, coroner’s officials said.

In May, in what was believed to be the first trial in the country based on violation of a car-seat law, a Florida judge acquitted a Nicaraguan refugee who was charged with manslaughter in connection with the death of his daughter.

Officials of the state attorney general’s office, the CHP and the Department of Motor Vehicles said they know of no manslaughter prosecutions under California’s car-seat law, which took effect in 1983.

A Los Angeles County prosecutor filed manslaughter charges in 1990 in connection with the death of a Newhall child, but the charges were dropped.