Idaho Mother Pleads Guilty to Felonies in Suffocation Death of 12-Day-Old Son

Allysen Armenta, 28, pleaded guilty to three felony counts after trying to pass off her newborn's death as SIDS. Her partner was sentenced to 6–15 years.

Idaho Mother Enters Felony Pleas in Infant Suffocation Case After Plea Deal Unravels

An Idaho mother has pleaded guilty to three felony counts in connection with the suffocation death of her 12-day-old son, after a last-minute legal complication forced prosecutors to seek more serious charges than originally planned, Law & Crime reports.

Allysen Armenta, 28, of Nampa, was initially set to plead guilty on July 30 to one count of failure to notify authorities and one count of injury to a child, with two additional charges — destruction of evidence and resisting arrest — expected to be dropped as part of a deal with the Canyon County Prosecutor's Office.

That hearing was cut short when Judge Thomas Witney halted the proceedings mid-plea. "A legal issue has come up," Witney told the courtroom. "It is necessary to give the attorneys time to conduct more legal research before we move forward." A roughly 30-minute recess preceded the announcement that the plea hearing would need to be rescheduled.

At her rescheduled hearing on Thursday, Armenta pleaded guilty to one count of injury to a child and two counts of evidence destruction. The two destruction counts were entered as Alford pleas, meaning Armenta maintains her innocence while acknowledging that sufficient evidence exists to convict her.

Infant Found Dead After Parents Texted Instead of Calling 911

Nampa police responded to a 911 call from Armenta's partner, Brian Lemke, 32, on Dec. 16, 2025, at approximately 3:32 a.m. Officers were directed to a property in the 300 block of Lone Star Road, where Lemke claimed the baby — Benjamin, known as "Benji" — had died inside a house. Investigators subsequently determined that Benji had actually died in a separate trailer on the property, and that the infant's body had been moved.

"Officers also found the infant's mother hiding in a camp trailer in the backyard," Nampa police said in a statement posted to Facebook. "She was taken into custody without incident on an unrelated out-of-county warrant."

Court documents obtained by local NBC affiliate KTVB show that Armenta and Lemke exchanged text messages with each other following Benji's death rather than immediately contacting emergency services. Both were originally charged with four felony counts: injury to a child, destruction of evidence, failure to report or delaying the reporting of a death, and resisting and obstructing law enforcement.

Authorities have not established who directly caused the infant's death. Police believe Benji suffocated inside the trailer, which was allegedly filled with trash, food, dirt, cigarettes, and animal feces. Armenta is accused of having rolled over onto the baby while co-sleeping. At her original July 30 hearing, before proceedings were interrupted, she was in the process of explaining that she had kept Benji in a home she acknowledged was "unfit for living" for an infant, and that she had a cellphone available with which she could have alerted first responders.

Partner Already Sentenced; Prior Child Welfare Cases on Record

Lemke was sentenced in late July to between six and 15 years in a state correctional facility after pleading guilty to failure to report a death and destruction of evidence.

Court records indicate the couple has multiple prior convictions for injuring children in Idaho. Other children from the household had been removed in recent years and placed in foster care, in some cases due to hazardous living conditions, according to KTVB.

Armenta is scheduled to be sentenced on Nov. 3.

Source: Law & Crime