Florida mom Alexandra Tobias pleads guilty to murdering baby for crying during her FarmVille game

BY Philip Caulfield
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Thursday, October 28th 2010, 2:22 PM

A Florida woman admitted shaking her 3-month-old baby to death after the little boy's crying distracted her from playing a wildly popular Facebook game.

Alexandra Tobias, 22, told cops she was playing FarmVille and her baby, Dylan Lee Edmondson, wouldn't stop crying.

According to the Florida Times-Union, she confessed to shaking the baby, smoking a cigarette to calm down and then shaking the baby again. The baby may have hit his head during the January incident.

Tobias pleaded guilty on Wednesday.

The young mom called paramedics after he stopped breathing. He was taken to a hospital with head injuries and a broken leg, The Times-Union reported. Doctors said the infant died from "abusive head trauma."

Tobias initially told police the child hit his head and stopped breathing after a dog knocked him off a couch, Jacksonville television station WJXT reported.

She later confessed to losing her temper while trying to concentrate on the game.

"It was enough to apparently put her over the edge," said Lt. Larry Schmitt of the Jacksonville sheriff's office.

FarmVille is a simulation game created by Zynga, a San Francisco-based company that uses Facebook and other social networks to distribute its games.

In the game, users act as virtual farmers, harvesting crops and raising cattle. The FarmVille Facebook page says the game has nearly 60 million active users.

Tobias faces at least 25 years in prison. She is scheduled to be sentenced in December.

I bet her crops won't be doing too well after 25 years in prison.