Owen Johnson was alone with his baby daughter for five minutes.

"Five minutes," Assistant District Attorney Karen Mansfield emphasized to a Lancaster County jury today.

And during those five minutes in November 2007, Mansfield said, Johnson repeatedly slammed his 2½-month-old baby against the coffee table in the living room of his Mount Joy home.

He carried the limp child to the kitchen, Mansfield said, and Johnson's girlfriend ran to a neighbor's house for help.

Ambulance personnel were called to the home and the baby was rushed to the hospital.

One week later, the child was dead.

Soon after, Johnson, 24, was charged with criminal homicide for the death of his daughter.

Today, in her opening statement, Mansfield told the jury that medical testimony will show that the once-healthy child sustained a fractured skull, severed spinal cord and fractured ribs, all of which occurred in the five minutes she was alone with Johnson.

And, Mansfield told jury members, by the end of the trial they will have heard enough evidence to convict Johnson of first-degree murder.

If the jury convicts Johnson of first-degree murder, the prosecution will ask the jury to impose the death penalty.

Judge Dennis Reinaker, before the trial started this morning, told the jurors not to concern themselves with the penalty, but to concentrate on listening to the facts of the case.

Both Johnson and his girlfriend, Marla Rabenstein, 18, the mother of the child, are deaf and do not have a telephone in the house, Mansfield told the jury.

But they communicate well enough with the next-door neighbors that when they needed help on the evening of Nov. 14, 2007, the neighbor was able to immediately call 911 for an ambulance.

The baby was taken to Lancaster General Hospital then transferred to Hershey Medical Center, where she later died.

Johnson, who has denied hurting his daughter, is represented by defense attorney John McMahon.

Rabenstein, who is expected to be the first witness called in the trial, told police at the time that the baby, Savannah, was generally healthy and appeared to be fine that evening.

Johnson had volunteered to feed the baby a bottle while she worked in the kitchen, police said Rabenstein told them.

It was during the five minutes that Johnson was alone with the baby — sitting in a chair in front of the coffee table — that the infant suffered the mortal injuries, Mansfield said.

Several medical doctors will explain the child's injuries during testimony in the trial, Mansfield said, but the repeated blows of the 11-pound baby against the coffee table will convince them to convict Johnson of first-degree murder because of the specific intent to kill — the key element of first-degree murder.

Before the trial began this morning, Reinaker swore in the four people who will take turns interpreting the court proceedings for the deaf defendant.

In addition, the spectator section of the courtroom was filled with about two dozen people, some of whom also were deaf or hearing impaired. Reinaker had the interpreters tell them they were not permitted to communicate with sign language during court proceedings.

The trial is expected to continue throughout the week.


Staff writer Janet Kelley can be reached at jkelley@LNPnews.com or 481-6026.