Trial Opens in Baby’s Shooting

The trial of a Laguna Niguel woman accused of mortally wounding her baby began Wednesday with a single overriding question: Was the shooting an accident or the deliberate act of a troubled woman? Calling the act an “ultimate violation of trust,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Robin Park told a jury in Santa Ana Superior Court that Shantae Molina, desperate for attention from the child’s father, intentionally fired a handgun into her 8-month-old baby’s skull after the man refused the defendant’s offer to have dinner.

The defense countered that Molina was afraid of an intruder trying enter her house and accidentally fired the weapon while trying to scare the prowler away.

“There’s no evidence during the life of this baby that this is anything but a happy mother,” said attorney Eric Lampel. “There is no doubt this case is nothing more than an accident.”

Molina, then 20, was alone with her child on Oct. 16, 1998, when she shot her son Armani Shyloh Contreras in the head. He died seven hours later, after two attempts at lifesaving surgery.

Immediately after the shooting, police said it appeared to be unintentional. But three weeks later in a San Diego restaurant, they arrested Molina for murder.

If convicted, she could be sentenced to 35 years to life in prison.

Wearing a thin beige cardigan over her slight frame, Molina sat quietly as opposing lawyers painted drastically different pictures of her personality.

Park said Molina was a sad woman fighting for the waning attentions of her boyfriend, who was living with another woman at the time.

After calling him from her parents’ house where she was living, she took her stepfather’s handgun from his bedroom and fired it four times: twice in the bedroom, once into an armchair and finally at her baby, the prosecutor said.

Lampel said sheriff’s investigators disregarded evidence that a prowler was lurking outside Molina’s house.