A Michigan mother who left her month-old child on the Daytona Beach shoreline and then lied about his whereabouts as the child struggled in the surf was sentenced Thursday to 15 years in prison followed by 15 years' probation.
Shamika Mitchell, 38, was found guilty as charged of unlawful desertion of a child, a third-degree felony, and aggravated child abuse , a first-degree felony, at an earlier trial. She faced up to 35 years in prison. The first charge is punishable by up to five years in prison while the second is punishable by up to 30 years. Circuit Judge Karen Foxman handed down the sentence at the S. Foxman also ordered that Mitchell have no unsupervised contact with minors as a term of her probation.
Mitchell will get credit for days' time served. Foxman said Mitchell was using marijuana, alcohol and something she believed might be meth while serving as the sole caregiver to her children. She said the child was saved just in time and could have been washed out to sea were it not for the people who discovered him in the surf. Foxman said that while she found testimony about Mitchell's mental health problems to be a mitigating factor, she also noted that Mitchell had continually lied to police about the child's whereabouts.
The state minimum guideline sentence, the least amount of prison time the judge could impose without a special finding, was 34 months. Mitchell was vacationing in Daytona Beach when she drove a rented minivan on Nov. Demetrios Greek Orthodox Church at N. Halifax Ave. Shortly before midnight, the guard saw Mitchell walk away while holding something in a red blanket.
During the trial, Assistant State Attorney Ashley Terwilleger played security videos from the nearby Ocean Center showing a woman Terwilleger identified as Mitchell carrying a child while walking past the convention center. Another video camera on the boardwalk recorded the same woman going down steps leading to the beach. The same camera recorded the woman a few minutes later returning from the beach. The video showed the woman swinging her arms as she walked, no longer holding the infant.
