Despite police officer’s heroics, Fresno infant dies after apparent bathtub drowning
A baby boy died Friday night after a bath-time incident, Fresno police said, despite an officer’s lifesaving efforts at the infant’s home.
Police arrived about 7 p.m. at an apartment in the 1200 block of East Clinton Avenue on a report of a possible drowning.
UPDATE: 10-month-old who drowned identified by coroner
The father told police he walked away for about a minute while giving the baby a bath but returned to find the child facedown in the water, police said.
An officer revived the baby, police said, gaining a pulse, but the baby was pronounced dead at Community Regional Medical Center a short time later.
Fresno Police Lt. Skye Leibee said an investigation is underway to see if there was any criminal negligence and “at this point, the information we do have, does not appear to be that, but we are going to explore all angles what actually occurred and why this event occurred.”
The parents performed CPR before an officer took over and fire and emergency personnel arrived.
It is not known how many people lived inside the apartment, Leibee said. The baby was just shy of his first birthday, Leibee said.
“We have called our family justice bureau detectives out,” he said. “A detective is responding at this point and once that detective gets here the detective will comb over all the evidence, all the information and a determination will be made whether or not there is criminal negligence.
“I don’t want to say there wasn’t at this point. It appears to be a tragedy obviously, but we have to explore all angles of this.”
This story was originally published July 29, 2022 at 9:58 PM.
