By Ernesto Londoño
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, October 4, 2007

With her swelling belly dominating her tiny frame, Ellen Griever's pregnancy was so obvious that colleagues offered to take her to a doctor -- even to throw her a shower. Again and again, the 22-year-old Bethesda woman denied she was expecting, once blaming a tumor for her expanding stomach.

Yesterday, reality came into sharp focus for Griever, a former child-care worker, as a Montgomery County judge sentenced her to 18 months in jail for delivering a full-term baby girl into a toilet last summer and doing nothing to keep her alive as the newborn made "gurgling" noises and moved around.

"I want to start out apologizing to my daughter," Griever said yesterday. "She paid the ultimate price because of my acts."

Circuit Court Judge Eric M. Johnson said the situation was "absolutely pathetic and sad, and it cost a little human being's life."

Griever, who was initially charged with first-degree murder, pleaded guilty to child abuse resulting in death.

The sentence was far shorter than the 12 to 20 years prosecutors had sought. Johnson said he was imposing a shorter term to ensure that Griever would be sent to the county jail, where he said she would receive meaningful treatment, rather than to a state prison, where, he said, "they just warehouse people." Montgomery County defendants sentenced to more than 18 months generally serve their terms in state facilities.

Investigators called Griever's behavior before the birth unfathomable and her calm demeanor afterward bewildering. She told detectives in videotaped interviews that she kept the pregnancy from her boyfriend, Joey Piemontese, because she was afraid he would leave her.

"She is not remorseful in those videotapes," Assistant State's Attorney Deborah W. Feinstein said. "She was not sad. It was chilling watching those videotapes."

Prosecutors said in a sentencing memorandum that Griever was at Piemontese's house June 25 last year when she delivered the baby on his toilet about 5 a.m.

Griever told detectives that the baby "like gurgled" for less than a minute, prosecutors said. According to the memorandum, when a detective asked why the baby stopped moving and making noises, Griever said, "I don't know, unless it was choking on its own mucus or whatever."

Her boyfriend came to the bathroom shortly after the delivery and helped Griever move to the shower, prosecutors said. She told detectives that she left the baby in the toilet most of the day before placing her in a plastic bag that night, they said.

Griever called Holy Cross Hospital that evening and spoke to someone who encouraged her to come in with the baby. Early the next morning, Griever placed the baby, in a bag, in the trunk of her boyfriend's car.

Griever and Piemontese then drove to his father's house, where Griever took a bath and the two watched the animated film "Finding Nemo" and "The Ellen DeGeneres Show." The baby's body was left in the trunk, prosecutors said.

That afternoon, Griever went to Holy Cross, where she told hospital workers that she hadn't known she was pregnant and that the baby was stillborn. Medical examiners later determined that the baby's head was in a position that prevented her from breathing and that she was asphyxiated.

Later, Griever told homicide detectives that a previous pregnancy had resulted in an abortion. "I was mostly worried, also, because I was like, I was afraid Joey would leave me," she told detectives, according to the memorandum.

Piemontese did not attend the hearing. Theresa Chernosky, the assistant public defender who defended Griever, questioned why he was not being held responsible for the baby's death. She argued that he must have known Griever was pregnant, because they shared a bed before the baby was born, and that he was in control after the delivery, while she was worn out.

"He's less than eight feet away when she's in the bathroom delivering the baby," Chernosky said.

Piemontese did not return a call seeking comment yesterday. A woman who answered the phone at his house said she believed he would not discuss the matter.

Staff researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report.