WARREN Police: Woman admitted she killed baby
The suspect's attorney says his client was tricked into giving a statement.
VINDICATOR STAFF REPORT
WARREN -- Police say a woman charged with murder admitted that she intentionally suffocated her newborn baby and hid the body in her father's home in Howland.
Danielle M. Lentine, 29, of Columbus, pleaded innocent to the murder charge in an appearance Saturday afternoon before Judge W. Wyatt McKay in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court.
Bond set: Judge McKay set bond at $50,000 and scheduled a pretrial hearing for April 2. Lentine was held in Trumbull County Jail.
Howland police launched an investigation March 17 after Lentine's father, Anthony Lentine Jr., called Trumbull County 911 and told officials he found a dead baby inside a garbage bag in a crawl space at his home on Brookwood Drive N.E.
Howland police Sgt. Paul Monroe retrieved the bag, and the remains were turned over to the Trumbull County Coroner's Office, according to an affidavit filed by Howland police Capt. Karl H. Compton.
The coroner has not determined the cause of death.
The affidavit said the crawl space was only accessible from the bedroom where Lentine used to live. Danielle Lentine has not lived at the Howland home since July 1999, according to an attorney representing Lentine's father.
On Friday, Monroe went to Columbus, where Lentine was living at the YMCA on Broad Street with her fianc & eacute; and 6-month-old son.
In an interview, Lentine told investigators that she was pregnant in late 1997 to early 1998 when she gave birth, the affidavit said.
"After the birth, the female child was moving about in her arms," the affidavit said. "[Danielle Lentine] further admitted that she had intentionally killed the infant by suffocating it. She also admitted to placing the baby in the garbage bag and then concealing it in the crawl space."
Arrest warrant: Based on the interview, Judge McKay issued an arrest warrant, and Lentine was transported to Trumbull County.
Lentine's attorney, Anthony Consoldane, said his client's statements in the affidavit are inaccurate.
"They tricked her into saying this," he told the judge during Saturday's brief hearing.
Anthony Lentine Jr.'s attorney released a statement Friday that said that at no time did Lentine's family know Danielle was pregnant.