Mother Avoids Jail in Fetus Drug Death

A woman charged with killing her fetus through drug use avoided prison, sobbing in relief after a judge said her sorrow was punishment enough. Talitha Renee Garrick, 27, received three years’ probation from Judge Thomas Cooper. She had pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter in the 1995 death of her 38-week-old fetus. She said she smoked crack cocaine a little more than an hour before the girl was delivered stillborn. A state Supreme Court ruling that a viable fetus is a person cleared the way for her prosecution.