Newborn in serious condition after being thrown from car
North Lauderdale, Fla. A newborn was tossed out a car window onto the grass beside a busy street Thursday afternoon, and the car sped off, authorities said.
Investigators were seeking the parents of the boy, whose umbilical cord was still attached when he was found by a woman passer-by. Doctors believe the infant was less than an hour old at the time.
Sheriff’s spokesman Jim Leljedal said the woman brought the infant to the sheriff’s office. The baby was taken to Broward General Medical Center, which upgraded his condition from critical to serious Thursday night.
It was unclear what injuries the eight-pound, two-ounce child suffered.
The woman who rescued the baby – who was inside a small plastic bag – said she saw a man and woman arguing inside the vehicle.
The baby was thrown from the passenger side, landing three or four feet away in the grass.
Nanny pleads guilty to endangerment
Eastchester, N.Y. A nanny who left a year-old toddler home alone while she went Christmas shopping pleaded guilty Wednesday to endangering a child.
Victoria Braithwaite, 27, was promised a sentence of three years probation and agreed to stay away from the little girl’s family.
Charges of reckless endangerment and using the family’s Mercedes-Benz without permission were dropped as part of the agreement.
Braithwaite, of Bronxville, was arrested Dec. 15 when she returned from her shopping trip to the home in Eastchester, where she had left the toddler sleeping. The girl’s mother had come home unexpectedly and found her daughter in her crib – unharmed – and the nanny missing. She called police.
Braithwaite told police “the baby was a good sleeper,” Eastchester police Lt. William Curran said at the time. “I guess she was gambling nothing would go wrong.”
Man dies after being shot with Taser
Chicago A man died after Chicago police used a Taser stun gun to subdue him Thursday, just days after a teenager was critically injured in a similar incident that prompted a lawsuit against the city.
A man, who police said was 54, went into cardiac arrest and died after officers used a Taser to restrain him at a building in the city’s Lakeview neighborhood, according to Fire Department spokesman Larry Langford. Authorities did not identify the man Thursday evening.
Police spokesman Pat Camden would only say that authorities were conducting an “in-custody death investigation.”
The death came the same day an official with the Department of Children and Family Services sued the city and a police officer who used a stun gun on a 14-year-old boy on Monday.
The stun weapons temporarily paralyze people with a 50,000-volt jolt delivered by two barbed darts with a current that can penetrate clothing.
Bar fight leads to discovery of tumor
Naples, Fla. A blow to the head with a beer bottle may have saved Sally Hampton’s life.
While doctors were examining her after the barroom attack, they discovered a brain tumor that could have killed her.
The tumor was removed, and Hampton, 64, is fully recovered.
On Monday, she testified against her attacker, Fidel Trujillo, who was convicted of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and sentenced to 12 1/2 years in prison.
“It was one of the worst things that could happen to an elderly person, but in the end it saved her life,” prosecutor Erik Lombillo said.
Hampton was attacked July 4 at a bar in Immokalee, a farming town in southwestern Florida. According to prosecutors, she put her hand on Trujillo’s shoulder to lead him out of the place when the bartender wanted to close up. Trujillo bashed her with a bottle and kicked her in the head and body when she fell.
Hampton was taken to Lehigh Regional Medical Center with injuries that were not life-threatening. During a test, doctors found the tumor.
Police bust mobile keg party
Rock Hill, S.C. Police found more than they bargained for on Monday when they stopped a U-Haul truck with a burned-out taillight.
Instead of furniture, police found a rolling keg party in the back with about 20 people drinking whiskey and beer. Eleven people were charged with underage drinking.
“They all kind of froze and didn’t know what to do, I guess,” officer Robert Marshall said.
The partygoers told police they rented the truck for someone’s 21st birthday party because the bars were closed. The moving party was traveling streets without a particular destination.
The truck’s driver first told police he was hauling a couch for a friend, according to police reports. But Marshall said he became suspicious after hearing scratching noises in the back of the vehicle.
The truck’s driver was charged with reckless driving because the people in the back could have been injured, police said. Officers allowed the partygoers to call for rides, and no one was arrested.