Mother to escape death sentence for boys-in-bay horror

Prosecutors will not pursue the death penalty for a mother who threw her three boys into San Francisco Bay.

Lashuan Harris, 23, of Oakland, California, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of murder.

Under a special circumstance alleging multiple deaths, she was eligible for the death penalty. Prosecutors, however, decided instead to pursue a life sentence after reviewing new information presented at Harris’ May 25 preliminary hearing, Debbie Mesloh, spokeswoman for the San Francisco district attorney’s office, said.

According to testimony at the hearing, Harris, said by her lawyer to be a paranoid schizophrenic, told police and a psychiatrist after the October 19 drownings that God told her to sacrifice her children – Treyshun Harris, six, Taronta Greeley, two, and Joshoa Greeley, 16 months.

In her videotaped confession to police, Harris described how she struggled with two of her boys as she stripped them and plunged them from Pier 7 in an area where tourists stroll along the waterfront. Her youngest boy laughed, thinking it was a game.

One of the bodies was recovered but the others were never found.

Harris will appear in court on June 8.