Pinay convicted of killing granddaughter in US

WASHINGTON – A grandmother of Filipino ancestry was convicted of first-degree murder on Thursday for throwing her two-year-old granddaughter over the edge of a 45-foot walkway. She faces 20 years to life in prison.

Carmela dela Rosa, 50, had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. She claimed she did not know right from wrong.

Dela Rosa and other relatives were on an outing at Tysons shopping center in Fairfax, a bedroom suburb of Washington, on the evening of Nov. 29, 2010 when she suddenly picked up Angelyn Ogdoc and threw her over the railing of the walkway connecting the mall and a parking garage.

Prosecutors said she was motivated by simmering anger at son-in-law James Ogdoc for getting her daughter Kathlyn pregnant out of wedlock.

A clinical psychologist for the prosecution told jurors Dela Rosa suffered from borderline personality disorder and was “angry, uncompromising, unforgiving and difficult.”

Defense lawyers said Dela Rosa had a major depressive disorder that included psychotic episodes and delusions and which was further aggravated after she learned that her brother died in the Philippines a week before Thanksgiving.

The killing was captured by a mall surveillance camera and Dela Rosa admitted in a videotaped interview with Fairfax County police that she did it out of anger at James Ogdoc, according to testimony.

After closing statements the jury had to choose from four verdicts: not guilty; not guilty by reason of insanity; guilty of first-degree murder, which implies the act was willful, deliberate and premeditated; or guilty of second-degree murder, which implies the act was committed but without those motives.