Mother charged with drowning baby in bath
Police in Italy have charged a mother with murdering her five-month-old son after she claimed he drowned in a bath while intruders tied her up, police and prosecutors said today.
Maria Patrizio, 29, was charged with aggravated homicide and simulating a crime, police Lt Col Michele Di Salvo said.
She was arrested in a Milan hospital in the early hours of this morning after being interrogated, authorities said. Patrizio “gave a partial but substantial confession", Anna Maria Delitala, prosecutor in Lecco, northern Italy, told a news conference.
Delitala said the woman admitted making up her version of what happened but was too distraught to talk about her son’s death.
Patrizio went to a local hospital during the night after feeling ill. Hiding her head in a cloth, she was led out by police after her arrest and remanded in custody in a Milan prison.
Patrizio, a bakery sales clerk and occasional model, reportedly told authorities that her son, Mirko, had drowned in the bath while intruders beat her, dragged her away and bound her in the family home in Valaperta di Casatenovo, near Lecco.
She is expected to remain in custody until a judge decides over the next few days whether to uphold the charges.
Italian news reports said she had initially told investigators that she was attacked from behind while she was bathing the baby.
Mirko’s May 18 death and the arrest of his mother was similar to another case in a northern Italian mountain hamlet, where a woman was convicted last year of bludgeoning to death her three-year-old son.
The woman, who maintains her innocence, was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
