'Emotion' Not Fact: Court Overturns Child Abuse Conviction
MOUNT CLEMENS, Mich. (AP) — The Michigan appeals court has overturned the child-abuse conviction of a woman whose 11-month-old daughter died after swallowing a morphine pill.
The court says there was insufficient evidence to show that Kim Murphy committed a reckless act that led to Trinity's death in Macomb County. Judge Elizabeth Gleicher says it's a case "built on emotion rather than fact or law."
Gleicher says no one really knows how the little girl got the morphine. Her late grandmother had a prescription for pain management, but the vial was out of reach.
Prosecutors claimed that Murphy failed to clean the home to ensure the morphine pills were removed. The appeals court says that might be "inaction" — but not a reckless act.
Murphy was sentenced to three years in prison.
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