A Puerto Rico woman charged over the 2024 death of her baby Leah Coral Cuevas Hernández in Las Piedras was released from jail in March after the Institute of Forensic Sciences revised the cause of death, which had initially been classified as a murder. Jaymillie Hernández told Telenoticias that her lawyer learned a reevaluation was underway because neither the pathologist nor the radiologist could find the blunt blow the initial autopsy described.
When the baby died, she was taken to a Diagnostic and Treatment Center (CDT), where the absence of vital signs was certified. At the time, the case was reclassified as a murder after the Institute of Forensic Sciences autopsy certified severe cranio-cerebral trauma as the cause. The revised classification is now undetermined cause.
Forenses said in written statements that when two pathologists reach different conclusions, a third evaluates the case, and in this instance the third pathologist’s conclusion matched the second pathologist’s; it added that such differences are uncommon but that its protocols establish how to handle them, and that the technical review’s conclusion was notified to the Public Ministry for the corresponding action. In 2024, Hernández had said on social media that there was never any abuse and that she never mistreated her daughters.