Woman Doped Breast Milk for Attention, Police Say
Aug. 17, 2009— -- A woman who was on probation for feeding her toddler son pain pills in California now faces felony assault charges for doping her infant daughter with a near-lethal dose of morphine in Oregon.
Police said Sara Rose Dillard, aka Sara Rose Lubin, drugged her 2-month-old daughter June 4 in an alleged attempt to get attention from the child's father.
The infant was immediately rushed to the critical care center at Doernbecher's Children's Hospital in Portland and survived.
But it took several weeks for officers to unravel Dillard's past and her previous conviction of Willful Cruelty to a Child under the last name of Lubin in Los Angeles. In the previous conviction, Dillard was also accused of creating a medical emergency to get the attention of her child's father.
Messages to Dillard's lawyer, Dean Smith, were not returned Friday, and ABCNews.com could not find a listed number for Dillard.
Dr. Marc Feldman, author of the book "Playing Sick," said the previous conviction, coupled with Washington County police reports, would lead him to guess that Dillard was suffering with a disorder called Munchausen's syndrome by proxy.
"There's little doubt, in my opinion, that it's a Munchausen's syndrome by proxy case," he said.
The Cleveland Clinic describes the disorder as "a mental illness in which a person acts as if an individual he or she is caring for has a physical or mental illness when the person is not really sick."
People with Munchausen's syndrome by proxy are most often women, frequently mothers, and "intentionally harm or describe nonexistent symptoms in their children to get the attention given to the family of someone who is sick," according to The Cleveland Clinic.
"I know a lot of people have asked about Munchausen's syndrome, but she hasn't been diagnosed by a professional," said Sgt. David Thompson, spokesman for the Washington County Sheriff's Office in Oregon.
Thompson said police are considering it an unusual case of child abuse.
