A 20-year-old woman was arrested Saturday, days after a newborn baby boy who still had his umbilical cord attached was found in an abandoned stroller on a South Los Angeles street corner, police said.
Belen Ramirez was arrested Saturday around 12:30 a.m. near the University of Southern California campus, Los Angeles Police Department Officer Mike Lopez said.
The arrest came after the newborn baby boy was found on Tuesday at Vermont Avenue and Dana Street (map) in South L.A.’s Adams-Normadie neighborhood, north of USC.
He was wearing pajamas and covered in sweat at the time of his discovery, and a Southwest Division detective said the infant was about 1 day old at the time.
The child was initially taken to California Hospital Medical Center and listed in stable condition. As of Saturday, Lopez said the child was likely with the L.A. County Department of Children and Family Services.
It was not known why the mother left the baby and additional information about the child’s father and family members was not known.
Ramirez was held in lieu of $100,000 bail after being arrested on suspicion of a felony count of child endangerment.
A passerby first saw a “dirty” stroller Monday night and assumed it had been discarded.
Then, on Tuesday, that witness noticed a clean blanket in the stroller.
“Something inside me just told me to check,” Alex Diaz said. “I just never thought I was gonna see that.”
Diaz said the infant’s clean appearance did not match the grisly circumstances.
“You took your time to dress him up, but you couldn’t take your time to take him somewhere safe,” Diaz said. “You just left him out on the street — threw him out like trash. Can’t do that to a baby.”
The stroller was found across from a church.
“It’s saddening … to think, here they are, this close to a church that has social services, and all they had to do was ring the bell,” said the Rev. David Matz of St. Agnes.
Under California’s Safely Surrendered Baby Law, parents or persons with lawful custody of a newborn infant can surrender the child within 72 hours of birth – with no questions asked – to hospitals, fire stations, or other locations approved by the county’s board of supervisors or fire agencies.