By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
CHEHALIS – There will be no trial to shed light on what signs of abuse she saw or didn’t see in the weeks before her 2-year-old daughter died while in the care of her new live-in boyfriend.
Becky M. Heupel plans to plead guilty.
The 31-year-old Centralia woman was in Lewis County Superior Court this afternoon where attorneys told a judge they’d reached a “resolution” in the case.
[1]Becky M. Heupel
The boyfriend James M. Reeder was sent to prison last month after pleading guilty to homicide by abuse, second-degree assault, two counts of first-degree rape of a child and possession of methamphetamine.
The toddler, Koralynn Fister, died from drowning and head trauma about 10 weeks after Reeder moved into the north Centralia household.
Lewis County prosecutors charged Heupel criminally, alleging she was warned Reeder was an abuser and chose to put her relationship with him before the well-being of her child.
Heupel is charged specifically with second-degree criminal mistreatment [2], allegedly recklessly creating an imminent and substantial risk of death or great bodily harm through her inaction.
Koralynn died on May 24 of last year.
The deal offered by prosecutors is that Heupel pleads guilty as charged and they will recommend she go to prison for a year and one day.
While the maximum penalty is five years, the standard sentencing range for someone with no criminal history is six to 12 months.
Her defense attorney, Paul Strophy, said part of the motivation is there are risks in going to trial. Prosecutors were threatening to upgrade the charges if they did, he said.
Lewis County Deputy Prosecutor Shane O’Rourke said part of the agreement is Heupel must make a straight guilty plea, not a so-called Alford plea in which the defendant pleads guilty without admitting wrongdoing.
“This is one where we want her to take responsibility,” O’Rourke said.
Reeder’s plea was an Alford plea.
Attorneys on both sides have agreed to recommend a sentence one day higher than the top of the standard sentence range, so Heupel can serve her time in state prison instead of in the Lewis County Jail.
Strophy didn’t go into detail about why that was preferable, but mentioned the opportunity for his client to earn more “good time” to possibly get out early. O’Rourke said prosecutors don’t mind if Heupel does her time with the state Department of Corrections, as that benefits the county budget by avoiding jail costs.
The hearing at which Heupel is scheduled to plead guilty will be held a week from tomorrow in front of Judge James Lawler.
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For background, read “Koralynn Fister: Dead toddler’s mother pleads innocent to putting little one in harm’s way” from Friday March 22, 2013, here [3]