Inset, from left: Victoria Moreno (Chicago Police Department) and Josiah Bell Brown (GoFundMe). Background: Navy Pier in Illinois, where Moreno killed 3-year-old Josiah (Google Maps).
An Illinois woman has been sentenced to decades in prison for killing her 3-year-old nephew after taking him to Chicago’s Navy Pier and pushing him into Lake Michigan, where he drowned as she and numerous witnesses looked on.
Cook County Judge Thomas Byrne on Thursday sentenced 38-year-old Victoria Moreno to 40 years in a state correctional facility for the 2022 killing of Josiah Bell Brown, according to court records.
The judge imposed the sentence after Moreno struck an agreement with prosecutors and pleaded guilty to first-degree murder.
As Law&Crime previously reported, Moreno was initially charged with attempted first-degree murder and aggravated battery of a child under 13 resulting in permanent disability after Josiah was rescued from the water in critical condition. Prosecutors later elevated the charges after the boy died.
Police said surveillance footage captured Moreno pushing the child into Lake Michigan near Navy Pier. Investigators said she stayed at the scene and made no effort to rescue him while he struggled in the water.
Witnesses and emergency responders eventually pulled Josiah from the lake and transported him to Lurie Children’s Hospital in extremely critical condition. He suffered cardiac arrest and died several days later, on Sept. 25, 2022.
Josiah had been in his grandmother’s care earlier that day. While the grandmother went upstairs to change clothes, Moreno took the boy and left in his mother’s vehicle.
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Moreno later told police that she brought Josiah to Navy Pier to “go on the rides.” But when officers initially questioned her after he entered the water, she said she was only a witness and did not know the child. She later admitted that Josiah was her nephew.
People along the lakefront also saw Moreno’s apparent failure to react while Josiah remained in the water.
“I will never forget seeing his face as he slipped under the surface,” one witness told authorities, adding, “It was absolutely horrible.”
Questions about Moreno’s fitness to stand trial subsequently delayed her case. She was found fit in February 2024, but later received additional psychological evaluations. Earlier this month, she was again found fit to stand trial while taking medication, according to a report from local ABC affiliate WLS.
Her attorneys have said Moreno has been diagnosed with depression, anxiety and bipolar disorder.
The post Aunt who shoved 3-year-old from pier, watched as ‘he slipped under the surface’ and drowned is sentenced first appeared on Law & Crime.
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