Baby cut from mother in critical condition, suspect jailed

A nearly full-term baby boy cut from the body of his mother remained in critical condition Tuesday in a Spokane hospital.

Officials at Deaconess Medical Center, citing privacy laws, refused to release additional information.

Police in Kennewick provided no new details on the horrific killing of the child’s mother last weekend. A woman has been jailed for the attack and the investigation is continuing, police spokesman Mike Blatman said.

Police cannot say whether the two women knew each other and were trying to determine the motive for the attack, Blatman said.

Araceli Camacho Gomez, 27, of Pasco, was found dead of multiple stab wounds in a Kennewick park. She had been attacked late Friday night, her hands and feet were bound with yarn and an autopsy showed she died of chest wounds.

“The autopsy indicated additional cuts in the area of the uterus consistent with the cutting of the body to remove the child,” Blatman said.

Phiengchai Sisouvanh Synhavong, 23, of Kennewick, remained in the Benton County jail without bail after being arrested for investigation of aggravated first-degree murder. She tried to pass the infant boy off as her own in calls made late Friday night to emergency dispatchers, police said.

Arraignment is scheduled today in Kennewick.

There is no telephone listing for the name Synhavong in the Tri-Cities area, which includes Kennewick, Pasco and Richland, but family members told KEPR Television she had been telling them she was pregnant and acting strangely in recent days. They said she worked with senior citizens and knew Camacho Gomez from work.

Friends of the dead woman’s family told the Tri-City Herald that a woman, believed to be Synhavong, met Camacho Gomez on a bus Friday and offered to give her some baby clothes.