Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

This makes me SICK. I'm glad to is being punished though.


Weighing 7 lbs., 2 oz. at birth, Alexis Catherine Greene gained only 4 oz. over the next month. She grew pale, became lethargic and struggled to breathe.

At 6 weeks old, she died, and an autopsy found enough morphine in her brain, liver and blood to kill an adult. With no puncture marks or other trauma, Alexis – authorities concluded – could only have gotten the drug through breast-feeding.

On Friday, her mother Stephanie Greene, 39, a former nurse from Campobello, S.C., was sentenced to 20 years in prison after being convicted of homicide by child abuse, involuntary manslaughter and unlawful conduct toward a child for allegedly passing on the morphine to her baby through breast milk.

"She loved her drugs more than she loved her child," prosecutor Barry Barnette told the Spartanburg, S.C., jury in summations Thursday, according to the Herald-Journal.

During the trial over the baby's November 2010 death, Greene was accused of using her nursing skills to "work the system" to hide from doctors that she was taking morphine and other drugs while pregnant and nursing.

Greene's attorney, Wise C. Rauch, plans to appeal, arguing that there was no evidence the morphine passed through the breast milk and that there has never been a reported U.S. case of a baby dying by morphine overdose through nursing.

Rauch told the jury that Greene suffered chronic pain from medical problems. He acknowledged she “may not have been as honest as she should have and that's the problem with pain medicine," but denied she was the criminal portrayed by the prosecution.

"They've made Stephanie Greene out to be a demon – drug-seeking, drug-addict demon – someone who has no concern for her child," Rauch said, according to the Herald-Journal. "Stephanie Greene is a woman in pain."

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Another article with more info....

SPARTANBURG, S.C. — A judge sentenced a South Carolina woman to 20 years in prison Friday for killing her 6-week-old daughter with what prosecutors say was an overdose of morphine delivered through her breast milk.
A prosecutor said Stephanie Greene, 39, was a nurse and knew the dangers of taking painkillers while pregnant and breast feeding, instead choosing to conceal her pregnancy from doctors so she could keep getting her prescriptions. She lost her nursing license in 2004 for trying to get drugs illegally.

Greene’s lawyer said she was only trying to stop debilitating pain from a car crash more than a decade before and relied on her own judgment and medical research on the Internet instead of the advice of doctors and is still overwhelmed with grief from the loss of her child.

The 20-year sentence was the minimum after a Spartanburg County jury found Greene guilty of homicide by child abuse Friday. She could have faced up to life behind bars. Greene will have to serve 16 years before she is eligible for parole. She said nothing in court and quietly shuffled out of the courtroom, her hands and feet shackled, after she was sentenced.

Her lawyer said she will appeal and it’s likely the case will be tied up for years to come. Both the prosecutor and Greene’s lawyer agree no mother has ever been prosecuted in the United States for killing her child through a substance transmitted in breast milk. Also, prosecutors didn’t prove how the baby got the morphine and there is little scientific evidence that enough morphine can gather in breast milk to kill an infant, Greene’s lawyer Rauch Wise said.

“The court can’t punish her any more than she already has been by losing a child,” Wise said. Greene’s husband did not talk to reporters. Wise said he supported his wife and was devastated as he prepared to raise their 7-year-old son alone.

Greene’s fourth pregnancy in 2010 was unplanned, but she and her husband of 10 years joyously accepted the surprise, her lawyer Rauch Wise said. She has two children from a previous marriage.

Alexis was born healthy, and her mother chose to breast feed. Forty-six days later, Greene called 911 to report her baby was unconscious in her bed. On a recording of the call, she sounds groggy and unfocused. The former nurse first tries to do CPR compressions on the baby’s back and has trouble counting to keep pace. Investigators at the scene found dozens of pill bottles and painkiller patches on her nightstand where the couple’s then 4-year-old son could get to them.

A toxicology report from the baby’s autopsy found a level of morphine in the child’s body that a pathologist testified could have been lethal for an adult, prosecutor Barry Barnette said.

A review of her medical records showed Greene carefully hid her pregnancy from her primary doctor. After a home pregnancy test showed she was pregnant, she told her doctor she needed to go to a gynecologist for a birth control. She then got prenatal care from that doctor while not telling her all the painkillers she was taking, Barnette said.

“She was a nurse. She knew how to work the system,” Barnette said. “She caused the loss of that child.”
But that is an unfair characterization of a woman who remains racked with chronic pain from a 1998 wreck where she fractured her skull and pelvis, Wise said.

“She needed those meds to get up in the morning and function,” Wise said. “She was on total disability because of her pain, her fibromyalgia and all the other things wrong with her.”

Greene still faces 38 counts of obtaining prescription drugs through fraud, and Barnette said he is still deciding whether to take those cases to court.

Greene had her nursing license suspended in South Carolina in 2004 because she was irrational at work, tried to call in a prescription illegally and refused a drug test, according to an order from the state’s Nursing Board.
Barnette doesn’t want his prosecution to stop women from breastfeeding. He took this case personally because his wife had a miscarriage in 1989. She is a nurse and personally reviewed the case.

“We make sacrifices every day for our children,” Barnette said. “She decided she was going to have her drugs and sacrifice the health, and ultimately the life, of her child.”

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

What a POS. She was a nurse, she knew to work the system and she had to have known these meds would kill her child but she breastfed anyway. Shame on her husband for apparently not giving a crap either. They should drug test him. That poor baby.

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

This is terrible!

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Stating the obvious here, but I'd love to hear her explain why she didn't just use formula. I'm sure she would say that she didn't think morphine passed through, but I don't think that is a reasonable answer from someone taking pills all day every day- I could buy it from someone who got a prescription and took it once or twice.

Message edited 4/5/2014 9:06:55 AM.

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

She was a nurse, she knew exactly what she was doing and that what she was taking would be passed on to the baby. If she needed the drugs that bad for her pain, then give the poor thing formula. She deserves to rot in jail for the rest of her life.

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

This is just so sad. Do what you want to your own body, but not when there is a baby involved.

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

I remember last summer right after dd was born something like this happened in the news. I remember sitting there while nursing dd mind you, telling dh the story and not even being able to breath I was crying so hard. When I was nursing I wouldn't take Tylenol, or even eat beans or broccoli for that matter. Makes me so mad, sick...etc etc.

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

This is so awful and sad.

Once I was told how BF was superior and I should have tried harder to BF by a woman was BFing and smoking a cigg while talking to me....yeah I bet her nicotine BF milk was better than my formula...

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

I hope she gets tortured in jail. And this is the garbage that gets to reproduce??? UNREAL.

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Posted by babyfever24

I hope she gets tortured in jail. And this is the garbage that gets to reproduce??? UNREAL.

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

As a nurse she should have known to give her baby formula instead of passing the drugs through her breastmilk. How awful, that poor baby

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

What a wacko and a murderer, of course.

Guess she rather spend her money on drugs than formula?

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

She should get life not just 20 years. I hope she rots. That poor sweet child...

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

I agree with a previous poster. She totally knew how it went through BM. I would bet money that she was puposely nursing to try to keep the baby from going through withdrawel. She didn't want to be forced to give the baby in for medical care. She could have kept her child alive if she just told someone that her and the baby needed help. She should rot in hell- the husband too- he knew what she was doing.

Message edited 4/5/2014 6:35:25 PM.

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Azzhole. She didn't give her baby formula because she would rather use her money to buy drugs. For one the justice system is doing it's job. People like this should not have kids.

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

"They've made Stephanie Greene out to be a demon – drug-seeking, drug-addict demon – someone who has no concern for her child," Rauch said, according to the Herald-Journal. "Stephanie Greene is a woman in pain."

I don't know what else to call it! She IS a demon and a monster with no concern for her child. Dumb lawyer

Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

This is disgusting. I breast feed my daughter and have suffered through several headaches bc I refuse to take Tylenol! Even though I am sure 2 tylenols once or twice isn't a big deal I still just choose to suffer through it. Same thing as an above poster, I cut out broccoli, cauliflower, beans...I cannot imagine morphine. Freaking give her formula of you want to do drugs.

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose

Re: Mom gets 20 years for baby's breast feeding drug overdose