By Craig Timberg
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, September 27, 1999; 1:15 p.m. EDT

RICHMOND, Sept. 27 – Authorities arrested Elizabeth Renee Otte this morning and charged her with murdering her 1-month-old baby by placing him in a microwave oven Thursday morning.

The action by the New Kent County Sheriff's Department signals that authorities are rejecting statements by Otte, 19, that a severe epileptic seizure caused her to become so severely disoriented that she put the baby, Joseph Lewis Martinez, in the microwave by accident.

Otte is being held without bond on the first-degree murder charge at a regional psychiatric facility, the sheriff's department said.

Otte was taking medication for epilepsy, friends and authorities said. Friends who spoke with Otte's immediate family said she told her family she had a seizure and believed she was putting a bottle of milk in the microwave.

Investigators were looking into whether she could have become so disoriented that she accidentally put the child into the microwave and killed him.

Friends of the family say Otte and the child's father, Joseph Anthony Martinez, 18, a plumber's assistant, were living together at the home of his parents in a one-story brick rancher near Chickahominy River in this tight-knit community 35 miles east of Richmond. The family told authorities that they awoke early Thursday morning to discover the baby missing.

After an exhaustive search, the baby's aunt discovered him in the microwave, where he had patches of redness and blisters, friends said.

A sheriff's deputy, called to the house at 5:43 a.m. to help search for the infant, was there when the family found the baby, who was declared dead at the scene, the New Kent County Sheriff's Office said.

Burn experts said they know of only one other case of a child being burned by a microwave. That case was not fatal.

Otte's baby was born Aug. 18. Friends of Otte's say her mood darkened and her epileptic seizures became more frequent after July 4, when her 17-year-old brother died in a fiery car crash not far from her New Kent County home.

Epilepsy is a generic term used to define a variety of seizure disorders, which are disturbances in the electrical activity of the brain. According to the Landover-based Epilepsy Foundation of America, an epileptic seizure focused on one part of the brain could lead a person to become temporarily confused and to commit unconscious acts. Symptoms can include dream states, distortion of time sense, illusions and hallucinations for up to half an hour after a seizure.

Roy C. Grzesiak, director of the National Burn Victim Foundation's forensic psychology unit, said that after suffering a severe seizure, a person can enter a state of clouded consciousness, confusion and disorientation. He said that in such a state, a person's 'higher thinking processes' may not be functioning, but that they may be able to perform mundane tasks, such as dressing and undressing or going to the bathroom.

A neighbor, Jeremy Hall, 20, said Otte's seizures sometimes left her confused and disoriented. "I've seen Liz have a seizure," Hall said. "She wakes up and will cook eggs on the counter."