By The newspaper
02 Apr 2024, 01:07 AM EDT
A Latino baby died more than a week after he and his 1-year-old brother were seriously injured in an overnight fire at their home in Washington Heights, Upper Manhattan (NYC).
The fire broke out for reasons not yet specified in an apartment at 206 Audubon Ave. around 10:54 p.m. on March 20, he recalled. Pix11. Authorities said yesterday that the 2-year-old boy, who has not been identified, was taken off life support on March 25.
His mother, Skilyn Maldonado, 23, allegedly went out to buy cigarettes when the fire started. The day after the fire she was charged with endangering the welfare of a minor. It is unclear whether charges would now be elevated for the boy’s death.
According to sources, an 8-year-old girl, the babies’ sister, told the officers that they had been left alone at home.
The oldest of the babies was in critical condition in the hospital for more than a week, until he died. The 1-year-old boy remained in critical condition yesterday, police said. Francisco Corporan, father of both, was previously interrogated and acquitted.
The children were rescued by neighbors when the older sister started banging on an apartment door saying there was a fire in hers.
It took nearly 60 firefighters an hour to control the flames, which spread into the building above a street-level restaurant, the Emergency Snack Bar Plus.
In a similar tragedy, on Good Friday a 9-year-old Latino boy died in a burning car behind a high school in New Jersey and his father, a school employee, was accused of setting the fire after a domestic dispute.
In January there was a spate of children killed in residential fires in New York and Connecticut.
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