Prosecutors say they’re determined to find justice for 8-month-old who died of fentanyl exposure by her mother
By J.D. Miles
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COLLIN COUNTY, Texas (KTVT) — A 24-year-old woman is on trial in the first known case of a baby dying from fentanyl poisoning in Collin County.
Mary Locke took the stand during the punishment phase of her jury trial.
The jury convicted Locke on Friday of first-degree injury to a child for the fentanyl poisoning death of her 8-month-old daughter, Elizabeth, and will soon decide whether she should go to prison.
“She’s scared because she doesn’t know how the jury is going to perceive her,” said Locke’s defense attorney, Ryan Kreck.
Locke told jurors that she was panhandling at retail stores to support a drug addiction along with the child’s father, who lived in an Allen apartment.
A police report said that on the evening Elizabeth died, “…they smoked 30 mg tablets of OXY with the goal of becoming intoxicated.”
Locke admitted on the witness stand that a bottle given to her child could have been contaminated with fentanyl.
“I watched her drink it for a couple of minutes. I went to wake her up, and that’s when I realized something was wrong,” Locke testified.
The couple found her the next day in a pool of blood and drove to a nearby hospital, where the police report said, “Upon arrival at the hospital, medical personnel estimated Elizabeth Whitener had been deceased in excess of 12 hours.”
Locke admitted to being high at the time her daughter was dying. But she is now trying to convince a jury that she’s been clean and sober since that day in 2023.
“She immediately was remorseful at the hospital, and she was told that her baby had died,” said Kreck.
It will be up to a jury to decide if Locke’s admitted reckless behavior and severe neglect deserve leniency because of drug abuse.
The case is being prosecuted by Ashleigh Woodall and investigated by Sarah Putnam with the Collin County District Attorney’s Office.
Locke could face a sentence ranging from probation to 99 years in prison.
That decision, in a first-of-its-kind case that shows the deadly consequences of fentanyl, could come as soon as Tuesday, Aug. 12.
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