June ’11 Trial Date Set For Woman Who Allegedly Threw Newborn From Window

The East Boston woman who allegedly threw her newborn son from her second-floor window will likely face trial in June of next year, Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said today.

EVA FLORES (D.O.B. 5/5/92) is charged with assault and battery on a child causing substantial bodily injury and wanton or reckless behavior creating a risk of serious bodily injury. In addition to scheduling the presumptive trial date of June 6, 2011, Clerk Magistrate Gary D. Wilson set Flores’ bail at $10,000 cash, noting that she is the subject of a detainer filed by U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement.

Assistant District Attorney Leora Joseph, Chief of Conley’s Child Protection Unit, told the court that the defendant’s neighbors in a Saratoga Street apartment building heard the “screaming and crying of a newborn infant in an abandoned alleyway near their address” on the night of Sept. 20.

“Upon doing some investigation with a flashlight, they observed a naked baby lying face down in a cement alleyway that is actually blocked off on either side,” Joseph said.

One of those neighbors jumped through a first floor window to retrieve the baby boy, Joseph said. The child had “his umbilical cord partially attached, scratches on his body and [was] covered in meconium,” Joseph told the court.

The neighbors contacted authorities. The alleyway, which was blocked by a permanent wooden barrier, had to be cleared by Boston firefighters before emergency medical technicians and Boston Police officers could get access to the child.

Paramedics rushed the newborn to Massachusetts General Hospital, where he was treated over a two-week period for a number of injuries, Joseph said. Although doctors were initially concerned about hypothermia, “they now realized that he had a skull fracture, brain bleeds, and a seizure disorder,” she said. The newborn was placed in a neck collar and is currently in a medical foster care program through the Department of Children and Families.

Flores was also transported to the hospital for medical treatment.

“A police investigation revealed that … the baby had been birthed that evening to this defendant,” Joseph said. Flores was living with family members on the second floor of the Saratoga Street apartment building adjacent to the alley, Joseph said, and was enrolled in a local high school.

“She revealed to investigators that she birthed the baby in the bathtub of her home, she had not told her mother she was pregnant, [and] that after the baby was born she opened the window in the bathroom and threw the baby out the window,” Joseph said.

After executing a search warrant on the home, Boston Police detectives measured a distance of 17 feet from the window to the ground below. Investigators also retrieved part of the umbilical cord from the drain pipe of the defendant’s bathtub and discovered bloody clothing, sheets, and towels in a white plastic bag under the defendant’s bed.

Flores allegedly told police that she did not want the baby, Joseph said, and that was the reason she threw him out the window.

Flores is represented by attorney Francisco Napolitano. She is expected to return to court on Dec. 22.