Mom Gets Life in Prison for Throwing Autistic Son Off Bridge

An Oregon woman who threw her 6-year-old autistic son off a bridge to his death pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life — as prosecutors accused her of a diabolical scheme to fake mental illness and get off with an insanity defense, NBC News reported.

Jillian McCabe, 35, who called 911 and confessed after she killed son London in November 2014, won't be eligible for parole for 25 years under the plea deal announced Tuesday. A call to her attorney was not returned.

After the boy's death, McCabe's in-laws described her as a woman in the throes of a breakdown who had been driven to the brink by the stress of caring for an autistic child and disabled husband.

But prosecutors said the subsequent investigation had turned up evidence that McCabe had "fabricated" her symptoms, researched ways to murder London, Googled "temporary insanity" and "insanity defense," and read up on the case of Andrea Yates, who drowned her five children in 2001 and was committed to a mental hospital.

At a press conference, London's father, who has since divorced, said he is haunted by the death of a "beautiful, loving, trusting little boy."

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