New Trial Ordered for Romeoville Daycare Worker Convicted of Fatally Shaking Plainfield Baby

JOLIET, IL — A new trial has been ordered for a woman found guilty of shaking a Plainfield baby to death at a Romeoville daycare, according to a report from The Herald-News.

Jennifer L. DelPrete was convicted of shaking 14-month-old Isabella Zielinski while caring for her in December 2002 at a daycare center in Romeoville. The infant, who suffered severe brain damage, died 10 months later.

Judge Carla Alessio Policandriotes also overturned DelPrete’s murder conviction, according to The Herald-News. Policandriotes has originally convicted the woman during a 2005 bench trial and gave her 20 years in prison.

In 2014, U.S. District Court Judge Matthew F. Kennelly ruled that DelPrete may be released after posting bond while the courts addressed her claims of innocence.

Kennelly's ruling was due in part to evidence discovered by Northwestern University’s Medill Justice Project. Northwestern undergraduate students, working with Medill Justice Project director Alec Klein, discovered a 2003 letter written by a police detective that points to DelPrete's innocence.

In the letter, the detective wrote that the pathologist who performed the infant's autopsy had significant doubts that DelPrete had violently shaken the infant, according to a press release from Northwestern.

DelPrete has maintained her innocence in the death of Zielinski.

Photo: Jennifer L. DelPrete/Patch Archives.