A woman who admitted helping her mother strangle a pregnant teenager and cut her unborn baby from her womb was sentenced Thursday to 30 years in prison.
Barely speaking above a whisper and fighting tears, Desiree Figueroa told Judge Peggy Chiampas that she was sorry. “I could never apologize for what I did enough at all,” she said. “That’s all, judge, thank you.”
Handing down the sentence, Chiampas told her, “You’re right, you can never apologize for what you did.”
Figueroa, 29, pleaded guilty in January to helping her mother, Clarisa Figueroa, strangle and then cut the baby from 19-year-old Marlen Ochoa-Lopez.
As part of a deal reached with prosecutors, Desiree Figueroa would receive a 30-year sentence and take the stand against her mother.
The trial never happened. Clarisa Figueroa, 51, also agreed to plead guilty in April and was sentenced to 50 years in prison. As part of her plea, she agreed to serve 100% of her sentence and acknowledged that she would not get early release on parole due to her age.
Prosecutors said the pair planned the killing for weeks before luring Ochoa-Lopez to Clarisa Figueroa’s home in the 4100 block of West 77th Place with an offer of free baby clothes.
It was actually the second time they had met with Ochoa-Lopez, but an earlier scheme was abandoned when Desiree Figueroa’s boyfriend threatened to call police if they harmed Ochoa-Lopez. They later told him it was an April Fool’s joke, prosecutors said.
Weeks later, Ochoa-Lopez returned to collect more items that Clarisa Figueroa said she was giving away.
As Ochoa-Lopez looked at a photo album of Clarisa Figueroa’s son, who had died not long before of natural causes, Clarisa Figueroa wrapped a length of coaxial cable around the pregnant teenager’s neck and pulled it tight.
As Clarisa Figueroa choked Ochoa-Lopez, she yelled at her daughter, “You’re not doing your f——— job” because Ochoa-Lopez was able to get her fingers between the cable and her throat, according to prosecutors.
Desiree Figueroa told investigators she then peeled the young woman’s fingers off the cable one-by-one until she stopped struggling, prosecutors said.
Clarisa Figueroa cut open Ochoa-Lopez’s womb with a kitchen knife and put her body in a trash container outside before calling 911 and reporting that she had given birth at home and the baby wasn’t breathing.
The child was taken to Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where he died weeks later after DNA testing confirmed his real parents.
In a statement read by prosecutors in court Thursday, Ochoa-Lopez’s husband Yovani Lopez said he believed God would be Desiree Figueroa’s ultimate judge, echoing statements he made during her mother’s sentencing.
Desiree Figueroa was also pregnant at the time of the murder and gave birth while being held without bail at the Cook County Jail on murder charges in the case.
“I pray this child will never know you are [their] mother,” Yovani Lopez said in the statement, adding that he believed Desiree Figueroa’s child was “a victim” as well.
Ochoa-Lopez’s relatives did not attend Thursday’s sentencing hearing.
A defense attorney for Desiree Figueroa alluded to a court-ordered report during the hearing that documented “a lot of horrifying challenges” in her upbringing. That report was ordered sealed by the judge.
In jail, she had taken general education and trade school classes and participated in significant therapy, her attorney said.
“You had a very difficult childhood and a lot of that had to do with your mom,” Chiampas acknowledged. “Unfortunately for you, that led to this today.”
While it is possible Desiree Figueroa might one day have some contact with her child, the judge noted that she robbed another family of the chance to raise a child.
“That’s something I want to you to remember every single day for the rest of your life as well,” Chiampas said.
