Commonwealth v. Lazarovich

The defendant, Janice L. Lazarovich, was convicted by a jury of having committed mayhem and assault and battery on her two year old daughter (child). She was sentenced to a term of eleven to sixteen years on the mayhem conviction and a concurrent sentence of two and one-half years on the assault and battery conviction to be served at the Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Framingham. The defendant appealed. We transferred the appeal to this court on our own motion.

It was the Commonwealth’s theory during the trial that the defendant either abused the child herself or engaged in a joint…