A west suburban Addison woman accused of violently shaking a 3-month-old baby pleaded not guilty nearly 15 years after she fled to avoid prosecution.

Rosa Tellez, 43, was arrested last week in DuPage County. Police had stopped her for a traffic violation when they found she was wanted on a 1995 warrant.

Tellez had been babysitting the infant, who was found with brain injuries.

Investigators say Tellez left a note behind saying she was leaving the country for Mexico. The baby involved survived and is now 15 years old and living out of state.

Vincent Smothers pleaded guilty to eight counts of second-degree murder and a gun charge in exchange for a minimum sentence of 52 years in prison. With credit for time served since his arrest, he could be freed when he's about 80 years old.

Smothers, 29, shocked police two years ago when he confessed to the eight Detroit slayings during around-the-clock interrogations. He told investigators his hits were all related to the drug trade except for the final one, the killing of Rose Cobb on the day after Christmas in 2007.

"He's just glad there's closure for everybody," defense attorney Gabi Silver told The Associated Press after the hearing in Wayne County Circuit Court, where jury selection was scheduled to begin Monday for the Cobb slaying.

Pharmacy Criminal Defense

State and federal laws prohibit pharmacists from filling prescriptions they know to be fraudulent, yet local police conducting sting operations are instructing pharmacists to break those laws.

Instead of arresting a suspect for passing a bogus prescription, detectives are telling pharmacists to fill the prescription while officers wait outside, ready to arrest the person carrying the pills.

Police get better evidence for court, and the suspect faces more time in prison on a more serious drug trafficking charge.

But caught in the middle are pharmacists who must balance their professional obligations as a health care provider with helping law enforcement in an action that is a crime and could put their professional licenses at risk.

As law enforcement agencies focus more resources on battling the illegal prescription drug trade, leaders in the pharmacy community are divided on what to do when asked to break dispensing laws.

The stings put pharmacists in a potentially dangerous situation that turns them from health care provider to an arm of law enforcement, the Florida Pharmacy Association says. And it may open them up to liability in a civil lawsuit if something went wrong.

Eighteen-year-old Andre Butler pleaded guilty to third-degree murder and other charges on Monday, the day his trial was scheduled to begin.

Police say Butler, then 16, was behind the wheel of a stolen Cadillac Escalade and leading police on a high-speed chase in September 2008 when the SUV crashed into a police car.

Forty-year-old Officer Isabel Nazario, who was in the cruiser's passenger seat, was killed instantly. Her partner was seriously injured.