Parents Held in 2 Cases of Child Abuse

Two Antelope Valley couples were arrested in unrelated incidents on charges of mistreating infants--a newborn boy found dead in a trash bin in Quartz Hill and a 4 1/2-month-old Palmdale girl declared brain-dead due to physical and drug abuse--the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department reported Wednesday.

Sharon Conley, 34, and Ronald Wesselman, 38, were arrested about 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at their apartment in the 4200 block of Avenue L in Quartz Hill, said Deputy Larry Mead.

The body of a newborn boy was found wrapped in plastic Sunday morning in a dumpster at the rear of the parents’ apartment building by a person searching the trash bin for aluminum cans, deputies said. Neighbors led investigators to the parents after deputies asked if there was a woman in the area who was recently pregnant but did not have a child, Mead said.

The couple were arrested on suspicion of murder when an autopsy determined that the child, who was several days old, was born alive and “died because of exposure,” Mead said.

In the other incident, 4 1/2-month-old Sabrina Przybyszewski of Palmdale was on life support at UCLA Medical Center, where she was declared brain-dead, Deputy John Ashley said.

The girl was flown to the hospital from Palmdale Medical Center, where she was taken about 4:30 a.m. Wednesday by deputies who responded to a 911 emergency call from the family’s home at 10340 East Ave. S.

Ashley said the call was made by Sabrina’s father, Christopher Daugherty, 33, who told a dispatcher that his daughter was not breathing.

After doctors concluded that drugs were involved, Daugherty and the girl’s mother, Elizabeth Ann Przybyszewski, were arrested for child abuse causing great bodily injury, Ashley said.

The type of drug involved in the case was not disclosed.