WOODLAND — Samantha Lee Green left a Yolo County courtroom in tears Friday morning, moments after a judge granted a prosecutor’s motion to charge the Woodland woman with murdering her infant son Justice Rees.
Judge David Rosenberg’s ruling followed a 20-minute hearing during which Green’s attorneys, thwarted in their plan for Green to admit to existing felony charges of involuntary manslaughter and child endangerment, accused the District Attorney’s Office of engaging in “vindictive prosecution.”
Prosecutors filed the motion to replace the manslaughter count with murder a day after Green’s lawyers requested Friday’s hearing to change the not-guilty plea she entered during her March 4 arraignment.
Had she pleaded guilty or no contest, Green, 23, faced at most a 12-year prison sentence, as opposed to an indeterminate life term that comes with a murder conviction. The DA’s office initially rejected a recommended murder charge in favor of involuntary manslaughter.
Supervising Deputy District Attorney Rob Gorman acknowledged that while the timing of the amendment may seem suspicious, “we made it clear that this is an ongoing investigation and charges could change, and that’s what’s happened,” he said in court. “As a result of the investigation, we now believe that Ms. Green can legitimately be prosecuted for murder.”
What triggered that belief, however, remains a mystery. Gorman said his office received “new information” following the arraignment that warrants the murder charge, but would not specify what investigators learned about Green’s alleged role in the death of her 3-week-old son, whose body was found Feb. 25 on the bank of Ridge Cut Slough in Knights Landing.
Yolo County sheriff’s detectives arrested Green three days later, saying she was the “sole person responsible” for her baby’s death.
Also unclear is whether the new evidence relates to a March 6 search at the Woodland home Green shared with Frank Rees, baby Justice’s father, where investigators reported finding methamphetamine and a drug-smoking pipe. Rees was arrested on drug-related charges after the search but posted bail later that night.
Gorman indicated the newly developed information likely won’t be made public until Green’s preliminary hearing, a court proceeding where a judge determines whether prosecutors have sufficient evidence for a case to proceed to trial.
Green’s lawyers, meanwhile, seemed unconvinced that such proof exists.
“There is no evidence of a direct intent to kill,” Deputy Public Defender David Muller said during Friday’s hearing. “The questions we have (are), what evidence have they received since the arraignment, when did they receive it, who did they receive it from, and why haven’t they disclosed it to the defense?”
In his ruling, Rosenberg noted that requests to amend criminal complaints traditionally have been granted at all stages of a case, even at trial, and that this one comes early on in the proceedings — just six days after the initial charges were filed.
“The mere fact that between March 4 and March 10 the defense submitted a request for change of plea does not in and of itself raise this to a vindictive prosecution,” he said. “This appears to be a somewhat complicated case with ongoing investigation, and the court’s conclusion is I will allow the amended complaint.”
Rosenberg also treated the hearing as an arraignment on the murder count. Green pleaded not guilty before returning to the Yolo County Jail, her $250,000 bail status replaced with a no-bail hold in light of the modified charge.
Public Defender Tracie Olson, who also is representing Green, declined to comment on the ruling after court, citing a court-issued gag order in the case.
Green is due back in court March 30 for a pre-hearing conference, at which time attorneys may set the preliminary hearing date.
In other developments in the case last week, the Yolo County Counsel’s Office announced it would be withholding the contents of a child welfare services file opened following Justice’s birth, when, according to a statement issued by the Rees family, the baby was found to have methamphetamine in his system.
County attorneys, acting on direction from the DA’s Office, said the documents likely won’t be released until the completion of the criminal investigation into the infant’s death, which could mean they remain sealed until the end of Green’s court proceedings.
— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene
