The daughter of Katherine Lea Stanfield has been accused of trying to influence the trial testimony of the victim’s great-grandmother.

Stacie Lynn Duval, 39, is expected to plead not guilty Thursday in 4th District Court in Boise to intimidating a witness, which carries a maximum of five years in prison.

Duval is accused of trying to harass Barbara E. Stearns, 80, of Caldwell, who testified for the prosecution in the trial of Duval’s mother.

A jury convicted Stanfield, 59, of first-degree murder in June for fatal injuries suffered by Wyatt Fesler, 2, in December 2009.

Wyatt, the son of Duval’s then-boyfriend, was being cared for by Stanfield at her in-home day-care business in Boise when paramedics arrived to find the boy unresponsive. He died two days later.

Stanfield was sentenced in August to 10 years to life in prison. She is housed at the Pocatello Women’s Correctional Center. Boise police arrested Duval Friday but she left jail on $50,000 bond.

Ada County Deputy Prosecutor Dan Dinger declined to discuss the details of the case Tuesday.

Duval has long maintained her mother’s innocence and decried the jury’s verdict in court last summer as other family members wept with disbelief.

But prosecutors said Stanfield slammed the boy's head into a hard object three times, apparently over his unwillingness to take off his coat. They pointed to forensic evidence that showed Wyatt suffered trauma to his spinal cord and head that resulted in bleeding to his brain. The boy had handprints on his shoulders and also had older bruises consistent with past abuse, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors said months before Stanfield’s trial that she’d tried to influence the testimony of her 8-year-old grandson. She told police the boy was in the room when Wyatt was injured, but the boy insisted he wasn’t there, according to previously published reports.

Stanfield called Duval from jail and said she should talk to the 8-year-old because his statements “look bad for me” and “it looks like I hurt Wyatt,” according to court records.

No charges have been filed regarding the boy.

Stearns was a witness for the prosecution in a trial that saw Stanfield’s lawyer portray Wyatt as a boy with medical issues, including equilibrium problems that caused him to fall and injure himself. Stearns didn’t describe him that way, however.

Stearns cried while testifying at Stanfield’s trial and described how Wyatt took his first steps into her arms and slept in a crib at the foot of her bed until he was 13 months old.

Court files do not list an attorney for Duval, and she could not be reached for comment.

Meghann M. Cuniff: 377-6418