Officers: Mother arrested after 1-month-old baby thrown at father
A 34-year-old Riviera Beach woman is accused of throwing her one-monthold baby at the child’s father during an argument and the infant sustained serious injuries when she hit the ground, police said.
According to the arrest report, Shana Raquel Vega pulled a knife on the baby’s father during the dispute. Then, she tossed the baby at him but he did not catch his daughter before she landed face down.
Vega picked up the child and ran north on Military Trail. The argument happened about 9 p.m.
Monday in a room where they lived at the InTown Suites Extended Stay hotel in the 5800 block of N. Military Trail.
Riviera Beach police and fire rescue searched the area for Vega and her daughter until they received a call from a woman in the 2500 block of Canterbury Drive South. The caller said a woman was sitting on her patio with a baby wrapped in a pinkish blanket.
The baby’s right eye was swollen, her orbital bone was fractured, her nose was cut, her face was red, her brain was bleeding, and her liver was lacerated, detectives later learned.
Vega was arrested on charges including aggravated child abuse and cruelty, child neglect with great bodily harm, and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. She was being held in the Palm Beach County Jail Wednesday on bonds totaling $45,000, records show.
During police questioning, Vega denied throwing or dropping the baby, but said she ran off with her because she feared losing custody of the child to the state’s Department of Children and Families, according to the arrest report.
Vega later told a DCF investigator that she tried to “hand over” the baby to the father but “accidentally dropped” her. The father ran off instead of picking up the baby so Vega picked up the child and left. Vega denied there was anything wrong with the baby’s health so she sought no medical care, the report stated.
The names of the father and the baby were redacted from the arrest report.