A Bronx mom is facing manslaughter charges for the drowning death of her 11-month-old girl last summer after investigators learned she left the infant unattended in a bathtub for more than 90 minutes, prosecutors said Saturday.
According to authorities, Victoria Rivera was running errands while little Jazeli Mirabal drowned in the tub inside their apartment on West Farms Road near Boone Ave. in Crotona Park on Aug. 14.
A grand jury indicted the 31-year-old mom on manslaughter charges, as well as criminally negligent homicide and endangering the welfare of a child, said Bronx prosecutors, who charged Rivera on Friday.
“(She) left her baby alone in a bathtub with water for an hour and a half while she went grocery shopping and picked up her other two children from daycare,” Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark said. “This was a callous disregard for the safety of her baby.”
Bronx Criminal Court Judge George Villegas ordered Rivera released without bail during an arraignment proceeding on Friday. Still, the mother was placed on house arrest and affixed with an ankle monitor so her movements could be tracked before she returns to court next month.
Investigators learned Rivera had repeatedly left Jazeli home alone for long periods of time before the child’s death.
After she returned to the apartment around 7:40 p.m. on Aug. 14, Rivera was seen running down the building’s hallway with Jazeli’s limp body in her arms, horrified neighbors told the Daily News.
“My baby’s dead!” she wailed as she sought help, neighbor Frank DeJesus recalled.
“We opened the door and we see that she’s screaming on the floor in the hallway. Our neighbor was holding the baby,” DeJesus said. “The baby was purple.”
DeJesus called 911 and relayed instructions from the operator to neighbors who had rushed to the child’s aid.
“Another neighbor came up and he grabbed the baby, and I was on the phone with 911,” DeJesus recalled. “They were telling me what to do, and I was telling him what to do.”
The baby spit out water as CPR was performed but she remained unconscious, DeJesus said.
The mother later told police the baby drowned in the bathtub, police sources said. An autopsy revealed bruises on the infant’s head. Her body temperature was 89.6 degrees, consistent with drowning at around the time Rivera left to run her errands.
The city’s medical examiner declared Jazeli’s death a homicide in November.
Jazeli was a happy and healthy baby girl whose older sisters, ages 2 and 4, doted on her, according to a 65-year-old friend of her mother.
“She had a pretty face,” the friend said. “She looked more like her dad. She has two older sisters and they always played with her. They loved their sister.”
The family had no previous contact with police or the Administration for Children’s Services.
An email to the Legal Aid Society, which represented Rivera at her arraignment, wasn’t immediately returned Saturday.
