Worcester - The lawyer for the defendant who is accused of murdering two infants and concealing the death of a third is to
file motions to dismiss the murder charges and surpress evidence seized by the authorities.
Three babies were found last September in the squalid apartment of defendant, Erika Murray, 31 formerly of Blackstone. Prosecutors say they were born alive. Murray is being held with out bail.
Defending Lawyer, Kieth Halpern is requesting money from the courts to hire a forensic anthropologist in addition to a forensic pathologist who has already been retained to examine the bones of the three corpses.
'The examination required in this case really involves a different type of expertise' Halpern said.
After the hearing, Halpern would not say why a forensic anthropologist would be useful to the case, but the American Board of Forensic Anthropology defines the field as the 'application of physical or biological anthropology' to the legal process by examining skeletal remains to assess a the age, sex, ancestry, stature and other unique features of a descendant.
A forensic pathologist, on the other hand, identifies the cause of death.
When Murray was indicted and arraigned in December, Halpern had said the evidence against her is too "weak and speculative" for a murder conviction, citing the lack of a cause of death from the state medical examiner.
The only evidence the state has, Halpern said, is that two babies 'were alive for some unknown period of time and for some unknown reason, died.'
According to prosecutors, Murray was the mother of all three infants and four other children removed from the home, including two without birth records who were found to be severely malnourished. She faces two counts of murder, one count of concealing a fetal death, two counts of assault and battery on a child causing substantial bodily injury, two counts of reckless endangerment of a child and two counts of animal cruelty.
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