A heartbreaking incident has shaken the city of Paris, France, after a United States teenager was arrested for allegedly throwing her newborn baby out of a hotel window, resulting in the infant’s death.
According to a statement released by the Paris Prosecutor’s Office, the unnamed young woman was taken to hospital for surgery after giving birth and was later placed in police custody. Authorities stated that the newborn “was allegedly thrown out of the second-floor window of a hotel” in the 20th arrondissement of Paris on Monday. “The newborn was taken to emergency care but did not survive.”
Prosecutors have opened a homicide inquiry into the death of the minor. Investigators suggest that the young woman, an American citizen traveling in Europe with a group of young adults, may not have been aware of her pregnancy or may have been in denial about it.
A spokesperson for the mayor of the 20th arrondissement told CNN that the baby was discovered alive in a trash can near the hotel before being rushed to Necker, a children’s hospital in Paris, where the infant later died.
Local residents were shaken by the incident. Maria, the caretaker of a building opposite the Ibis hotel where the incident occurred, recalled, “There were police cars and ambulances… Officers later knocked on my door seeking eyewitness accounts.”