On September 20 at 11:14 a.m. police responded to a Bristol Street home for a possible child abuse investigation.
Police responded after reports that a 20-month-old boy was having trouble breathing. When the New London Fire Department ambulance arrived, paramedics determined that the child was suffering from severe burns.
He was taken to Lawrence and Memorial Hospital, and then was taken by LifeStar to Shriner’s Children’s Hospital in Boston. The boy had first- and second-degree burns on about 50 percent of his body.
A day after the boy was airlifted to the hospital his condition was upgraded to stable from serious.
At the time, police questioned the boy’s parents and others, and the case was sent to the State’s Attorney’s Office and the Department of Children and Families.
On October 27, Elizabeth Mendez-Marchany, 39, who lives in the Bristol Street home, was arrested and charged with assault in the third degree, risk of injury to a minor and providing a false statement to police.
Mendez-Marchany’s original statement to police was found to be inconsistent with the child’s injuries, according to doctors. After several interviews, Mendez-Marchany eventually admitted that she put the child in a bathtub unattended with the water running.
The extended exposure to the hot water caused the serious inuries to the child.
She is being held on a $150,000 bond.
