Police: Woman stabbed friend before leaving her baby in dumpster
Police on Tuesday released more details about a 24-year-old who they said stabbed a friend and left the woman’s baby in a New Haven dumpster.
The 8-month-old baby survived and remains at Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital, where she was being treated for burns on her hands, police said. Investigators have not determined who burned her.
Andiana Griciel “Nuni” Velez, of Hamden, was arrested Monday and charged with risk of injury to a child, second-degree assault and first-degree reckless endangerment. During her arraignment Tuesday in Superior Court in New Haven, a judge set her bail at $500,000 and ordered a mental health watch and evaluation. The case was continued to Oct. 30.
A maintenance worker found the baby in a dumpster about 2p.m. Monday outside the Presidential Gardens apartments, 573 Dixwell Ave., Capt. Anthony Duff said. Officers called an ambulance and she was taken to the hospital.
In a police report released Tuesday afternoon, New Haven officers described a call that preceded the worker’s discovery: They were called to an Ella T. Grasso Boulevard gas station for a reported carjacking.
When they arrived, officers talked to the mother of the child, who was screaming that her friend, Velez, had tried to kill her and took her baby. The mother’s and baby’s names were blacked out of the report.
Velez, who had babysat the girl all weekend, had the baby with her when she picked up the mother so they could fill out housing applications, the mother told police. The mother was in the front passenger seat and the baby was in the back.
Velez stopped at the gas station, got out of the driver’s seat andw ent to the backseat, saying she had to get her purse, the mother said. The mother then felt a jab on her neck, and when she turned around, she saw Velez holding a large butcher knife, according to the report.
“Andiana continued stabbing her throughout her body,” the report said.
The women struggled over the knife, and the mother was able to knock it out of Velez’s hand before getting out of the car and running to safety, it said. Velez then got back into the drivers seat and slowly drove away, with the baby still in the backseat.
Velez told police the mother is the one who pulled the knife onher and stabbed her. Velez had brought up the fact the baby had burns on her hands when Velez had picked up the child on Friday, according to the report, and the mother said she would blame Velez, Velez told police.
Officers reviewed video from the gas station, but could not see what happened inside the car because of its tinted windows, the report said. The mother had several very small puncture wounds on the left side of her face, and Velez had two small cuts on her fingers.
The officers went with the victim to Velez’s Hamden home, but did not find her there. While there, they learned the baby had been found in the Dixwell Avenue dumpster.
Surveillance video picked up Velez’s vehicle driving through the parking lot where the dumpster was located, the report read.
When officers reached Velez on the phone, she said she gave the baby to her godfather, who drove a similar vehicle, according to the report.
Velez agreed to come to the police station, where she admitted to detectives that the baby was in the backseat of her car during the altercation and that she had put the child in the dumpster, the report said.
The incident andthe child’s injuries remain under investigation by New Haven police and the state Department of Children and Families.