A 24-year-old Orem man who was acquitted by a jury of killing his girlfriend's baby boy, but convicted of lying to police about events leading up to the child's death, has been sentenced to probation with no additional jail time.
Christopher Thunborg was found not guilty last year of second-degree felony child abuse homicide for the March 11, 2008, death of 13-month-old Austin Pettersson.
But the 4th District Court jury found Thunborg guilty of obstructing justice, a third-degree felony carrying a potential prison term of up to five years.
Defense attorneys subsequently claimed the obstructing conviction should be dismissed because Thunborg was not convicted of the underlying homicide count.
On Thursday, Judge David Mortensen rejected the defense arguments and sentenced Thunborg to 36 months probation, which includes completing an anger management class.
Thunborg was given credit for the nearly two years he has spent in jail or on GPS monitoring.
During a November trial, Thunborg denied intentionally harming the child, but described taking an accidental tumble with the boy.
Thunborg -- who was watching the boy for his girlfriend, 19-year-old Whitney Pettersson, while she worked a night shift -- testified the child was in his arms when he stepped on a puppy, fell to the floor and landed on top of the boy.
Thunborg said the impact seemed to knock the wind out of the baby, but the child stopped crying when he saw his bottle. The next morning, the boy was not breathing. He was pronounced dead at a hospital.
During an initial interview with police, Thunborg omitted mention of the accidental fall, which is the basis of the obstructing count.
A medical examiner testified the likely cause of death was a laceration on the boy's small intestine and a tear in his stomach resulting from blunt-force trauma.
But there was also evidence of an earlier internal injury. A defense expert testified that prior injury resulted in an infection that was the primary cause of the boy's death and which also made the child more susceptible to the consequences of the fall described by Thunborg.
