Woman guilty in death of baby found in lake

GRETNA — A 22-year-old woman accused of drowning her newborn baby in Lake Pontchartrain has
 been convicted of second-degree murder 
Ciara Craig, of Metairie, will be sentenced Jan. 7 to a mandatory no-parole life in prison sentence. A jury in Gretna found her guilty late Friday in the infant's death Feb. 10.
Defense attorneys contended Craig was a financially strapped young mother whose child had been stillborn and she had no money for a proper burial. Prosecutors said the baby was born alive and she was trying to find her way out of a possible rebuke from her family over an unplanned pregnancy.
State District Judge Robert Pitre allowed the jury to consider lesser charges of manslaughter and negligent homicide.
Craig testified how she gave birth in secret at her Metairie home, rushed her baby to Lake Pontchartrain, said a prayer and placed her newborn daughter in the water. She said her daughter had been stillborn, the umbilical cord wrapped twice around the neck.
Craig said she kept the pregnancy to herself, only admitting to it after being pressed by her family after the news broke that Kenner police had found an infant in the lake. She also said she had made an appointment to give the baby away four days before the birth.
"Not wanting a pregnancy and not wanting a child does not equate to murder," defense attorney Morris Reed said in his closing arguments.
Police contended that a tape-recorded conversation between Craig and an investigator showed that she admitted to feeling a heartbeat before putting the girl in the lake. But Craig said all she was saying was that she had felt for a heartbeat before dumping the baby.