Simi Girl, 16, Held in Death of Newborn Baby
A 16-year-old Simi Valley girl was arrested at her high school Tuesday and charged with the murder of a newborn baby that was left in a dumpster in January, Simi Valley police said.
The girl was arrested at about 12:20 p.m., taken to the Simi Valley Police Station and later transferred to Ventura County Juvenile Hall in Ventura, Lt. Don Austin said. He declined to identify the girl or her high school.
Austin said investigators got a break Tuesday morning when officers conducting an unrelated burglary investigation stumbled across the information that led police to the girl who is believed to be the mother of abandoned baby.
Austin said the break ended a frustrating investigation that “didn’t go anywhere” for months.
The infant, wrapped inside a green plastic trash bag, was found shortly after noon by a transient looking through a trash dumpster behind an Alpha Beta supermarket on the 4500 block of Alamo Street in Simi Valley on Jan. 6.
An autopsy determined that the baby died of exposure about three hours after her birth.
Nearly 100 mourners attended a funeral service for the child at Assumption Cemetery in Ventura and the Simi Valley Police Officers Assn. provided a grave marker.
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