Trial To Begin For Lake Elsinore Mom Charged With Torturing Her Toddler With Scalding Water

Jury selection is set to begin a week from today for the trial of a Lake Elsinore woman accused of thrusting her toddler's legs into scalding hot water as punishment, causing third-degree burns.

Diana Vicky Estrada, 26, could face life in prison if convicted of torture, inflicting corporal injury to a child and a sentence-enhancing great bodily injury allegation.

She's being held without bail at the Indio Jail.

Estrada's attorney, John Pozza, and Riverside County Deputy District Attorney Julie Baldwin both informed Superior Court Judge Timothy Freer today that they were ready for trial. However, a courtroom won't be available at the Southwest Justice Center until next Monday.

The defendant was arrested in August 2009 after she took her then-18-month-old daughter Princella into a Lake Elsinore medical clinic with burned feet and legs. The child's toes had turned black from a scalding, and she was transferred to the Arrowhead Regional Medical Center burn unit in Colton for treatment, including skin grafts.

Riverside County sheriff's investigators spoke with Princella's 4-year-old sister, Liliana, who told them the defendant had gotten angry when the younger child soiled her drawers. According to testimony from Estrada's preliminary hearing, the woman allegedly filled a bathtub with steaming hot water and immersed Princella's bottom half into it.

Liliana told investigators that her sister was crying and had "red blood owies.''

In 2007, Estrada was charged with child abuse for beating Liliana, both of whose arms had been broken at different times. Estrada pleaded guilty a year later and was sentenced to 180 days in jail and 48 months probation. She was also permitted to retain custody of the children. Princella had just been born.

Both children are now in foster care.

Liliana's father, Fabian Cayetano Urrea, is serving a life sentence for killing the defendant's husband, Jorge Estrada, in 2005. Urrea and Diana Estrada had been romantically involved before she met and married Jorge Estrada. Urrea was angry because the National Guardsman planned to raise Liliana as his own.

Princella's father has not been identified. --City News Service