In the end, there is emptiness on both sides.

Hannah Rose Juceam has been dead for more than two years.

In that time, two Placer County juries have been unable to agree on whether Veronica Martinez Salcedo, the 16-month-old girl's nanny, caused her death by shaking her to stop her from crying.

Last week, the Placer County District Attorney's Office, concluding the case couldn't be won, said there won't be a third trial.

Hannah's parents, Scott and Lorena Juceam, made Martinez Salcedo's prosecution a personal cause and dedicated themselves to public education about the dangers of shaking babies.

Last week's decision to drop the case left them disappointed.

"We're just sad, terribly, terribly sad," said Scott Juceam. "Justice was not served."

Martinez Salcedo's family and her lawyer, on the other hand, say she simply didn't do it. They contend the death was caused by a blood clot, and the nanny's arrest and prosecution were "a rush to judgment."

Two juries could not be convinced that Martinez Salcedo caused injuries that led to Hannah's death, but the Juceams never had any doubt.

"Her rotten soul knows that she took my daughter's life," Lorena Juceam said about Martinez Salcedo after the second mistrial on June 26.

The Juceams don't intend to let the matter drop. The couple have filed a wrongful-death civil lawsuit against Martinez Salcedo.

"We don't move on, we live on," Scott Juceam said.

A hearing in the civil suit is scheduled for later this year, but the former nanny may not be in California to attend it.

Martinez Salcedo, who was in the United States illegally, faces deportation to Mexico. She has been in jail since her arrest, but is scheduled for a bail hearing Wednesday at an immigration court in San Francisco.

Through Friday, she had not hired an attorney to represent her in the immigration process, a federal official told The Bee. It is possible that Martinez Salcedo will waive bail and ask to be deported to Mexico, said Lori Haley, a spokeswoman for the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

Family members and the attorney who defended Martinez Salcedo in the criminal case have continually maintained that she did not cause the child's death.

They say the nanny's arrest, and her years in jail separated from her own two children, are an extension of the tragedy

"The child likely died from a stroke caused by a blood clot" in her brain prior to the day she was found unresponsive, said Martinez Salcedo's attorney, Mary Beth Acton.

The two trials showed that juries, the attorneys and the families of Juceam and Martinez Salcedo will never agree on who or what caused Hannah's death.

The child became unresponsive on May 11, 2006, while being watched by Martinez Salcedo. Lorena Juceam was out of the house running an errand when she was contacted on a cell phone by the nanny.

Placer District Attorney Brad Fenocchio said physicians who attended to Hannah at the hospital concluded that she suffered brain injuries caused by violent shaking.

Her parents decided to pull Hannah off life support two days later after doctors told them she had little to no chance of living a normal life if she survived.

The two trials hinged on the testimony of expert defense witnesses who concluded that there was a blood clot that may have led to a stroke.

The first trial ended Oct. 31, 2007, with a jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of conviction. The second trial concluded with a 9-3 vote favoring acquittal.

The prosecutors, after spending nearly $80,000 on their own medical experts and transcripts in the two trials, are left to ponder how to deal with shaken baby cases in the future.

"In discussing them with other district attorneys, we know these are not easy cases to prove," Fenocchio said.

"But that doesn't mean that they can't be proven or that we shouldn't try when all the facts appear to give a logical connection between physical force and subsequent death in a child."

Following last week's dismissal of the charges of assault causing death of a child against Martinez Salcedo, family friend Lorraine Chavez summed up the two-year, three-month ordeal for both sides.

"This was like a no-win situation for everyone," she said.

Call The Bee's Art Campos, (916) 773-2825.