Prosecutors want police to do more investigating before deciding whether to file charges against a woman suspected of giving birth and abandoning the infant — with his umbilical cord still attached — in a stroller near a South Los Angeles church, a district attorney’s spokeswoman said Tuesday.
Belen Ramirez, 20, of Long Beach was arrested about 12:30 a.m. Saturday by Los Angeles Police and booked on suspicion of child endangerment, with bail set at $100,000.
Police were sent to Vermont Avenue and Dana Street shortly before 1 p.m. Aug. 4 on a call from a witness, said LAPD Officer Drake Madison. Paramedics took the child to a hospital, where he was reported in good condition.
Authorities believe the child had been in the stroller for about 18 hours before being found.
Alex Diaz told reporters he initially spotted the stroller at the same location Monday night, but assumed it was empty and had been discarded.
“The stroller was real dirty,” he said.
When he saw it there the next day, he walked up to the stroller, “pulled the blanket down, and found a baby’s head. I thought he was dead. He wasn’t moving. He wasn’t making any noise at all.”
Diaz said he moved the stroller to the shade of a nearby tree, “and as soon as I touched him, he started moving and crying.”
Under the county’s “Safe Surrender” law, which was enacted in 2001, a parent or guardian is allowed to surrender an infant who is no more than three days old at a hospital or fire station without repercussions if the baby shows no sign of abuse.
—City News Service