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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A Utah woman accused of leaving her newborn in the trash will undergo a new psychological test to see if she has any underlying mental illness that could be treated at the Utah State Hospital, authorities said Thursday.
Prosecutors have been pushing for Alicia Englert, 24, to be placed at the hospital so she can face an attempted murder trial. Judge Elizabeth Hruby-Mills decided a year ago that Englert isn't fit for trial because her IQ is too low.
She was ordered to undergo treatment to see if they could prepare her for trial, but prosecutors said in March that it hasn't worked so far. At a hearing in Salt Lake City, Englert's lawyers said they've agreed to a new test that will determine if she has a disorder that can be treated at the state hospital.
"We just need to know one way or the other if that's the case," said prosecutor Robert Parrish.
Hruby-Mills set a new hearing date for June 27. Englert has not entered a plea.
Defense attorneys have said she has an inherent intellectual disability and may never be competent. Utah law says a defendant must have an IQ of 70 to face trial.
Though Englert was able to finish high school, her lawyer has said that a single conversation shows she doesn't function at typical adult level. Her parents maintain that she doesn't understand the gravity of what she did.
Englert gave birth in a bathroom at her home in the Salt Lake City suburb of Kearns and left the baby girl without food or medical care for a day before wrapping her in a towel and abandoning her in the trash on Aug. 26, 2014, authorities said.
Prosecutors say the infant would have died if she had not been found by a neighbor who thought she heard a cat purring in the garbage. She was suffering from hypothermia, respiratory distress and a blood-borne infection when she was found.
The girl was flown to a hospital and placed on a ventilator, but she recovered and was adopted.
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