Lives cut short

"What I'm seeing is a lot of backsliding both among law enforcement and otherwise," he said.

Of 13 cases in Salt Lake County since 1999, the district attorney's office filed murder charges in five, but no one was convicted on that charge.

A jury found one guilty on a reduced charge of second-degree felony child-abuse homicide, three pleaded to guilty to second-degree child-abuse homicide. The fifth case is pending.

Though circumstances differ in each case, a study of cases shows Weber County prosecutors appear to take a tougher stance against child murder than do their counterparts in Salt Lake County.

"Child-abuse homicide is an easy way out for prosecutors. I'm not happy with it. It lessens the value of a child's life," said DeCaria, the Weber County attorney.

"My view is that if someone beats a kid up until he dies, that's not going to cut it as a child-abuse homicide. You talk to defense attorneys and they act like he was just trying to punish this kid. You take steps that indicate depraved indifference to a child's life, you're going to murder, not child homicide in this county."

Of eight child abuse-related deaths in Weber County since 1999, prosecutors filed first-degree murder charges in six. Four pleaded guilty or were found guilty at trial and received five years to life in prison. County prosecutors also filed one capital homicide charge during that time. That defendant pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of murder for beating and shaking his 4-month-old son to death. He also received five years to life.

Cope said Salt Lake County prosecutors "tend to call a spade a spade. If we have a child-abuse homicide, we're going to call it that. If we have a murder, we're going to call it that.

"Very few people intend to kill the child when they do what they do. They're just doing something crazy or stupid or outrageous, but they're not really wanting to kill the child. That's the result, but that's not their intent when they start out."

No child killer in Salt Lake County in the past five years has received a sentence greater than one to 15 years in prison. Prosecutors tend to resolve cases through plea agreements on lesser charges.

This infuriates Parrish.

Given that interpretation, he said, "the great majority of child abuse and child murder will go unpunished in the criminal courts."

Experts recognize that most serious physical abuse and child murder is not premeditated or "intentional" but rather is an impulsive act.