Jury Begins Deliberations in Toddler’s Death

When Teresa Rodriguez gave birth to her second child, she did not tell doctors she had been using heroin through her pregnancy, causing the infant to suffer “bone-crushing pain” in its first minutes of life.

A defense attorney for Rodriguez’s ex-boyfriend, who is on trial for allegedly torturing and killing a 14-month-old boy, said the incident proves Rodriguez is capable of inflicting harm on children.

“It shows you she has less consideration for human life than a snake,” attorney Steve Powell told a Ventura County jury Friday during closing arguments in the case against Patrick Santillano, a 34-year-old Oxnard drug dealer.

“When that baby took its first breath of oxygen, that baby learned the pain of withdrawal,” Powell said. “And she didn’t care. She didn’t care at all.”

Santillano is accused of beating, gagging, starving and killing Demitri Robledo, whose mother left him with Rodriguez and Santillano in a south Oxnard garage after she was arrested on suspected cocaine use.

But Powell continued to argue Friday that prosecutors have wrongly accused Santillano of crimes perpetrated by Rodriguez, a 20-year-old heroin addict.

“She is the one guilty of the offenses with which my client is charged,” Powell said. “She is the one who did it.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Cheryl Temple, however, told jurors the defense theory does not make sense. If Rodriguez had tortured Demitri for weeks, Temple asked, why would she have sat in jail for four months in connection with his death before implicating Santillano? Rodriguez later pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and mayhem.

“It’s absurd,” Temple said. “You would have to rely on complete speculation for that to be true.” She said Rodriguez is a sad and pathetic woman, but not someone violent enough to torture and abuse a child.

“No way -- not like the defendant,” Temple argued.

The decision is now left to jurors, who began deliberations Friday.

The daylong closing arguments capped a three-week trial that told the story of Demitri’s short and tragic life.

According to prosecutors, Demitri had only a rash when his father dropped him off at Rodriguez’s McMillan Avenue apartment on Aug. 8, 2000. Weeks later the boy’s mother, Yvette Robledo, went to the apartment when she was released from jail. She bought drugs from Santillano but left the boy, Temple said.

On Oct. 22, Rodriguez drove Demitri to St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Oxnard, where he was pronounced dead.

Rodriguez told authorities Santillano had slapped the boy, tied his hands behind his back and stuffed socks down his throat to keep him from scratching and crying. Santillano became especially irritated, Rodriguez said, when the boy disturbed him while Santillano tried to use heroin.