Mother, Baby Reported Recovering

A woman who was struck by a hit-and-run driver while crossing Interstate 5 near the Mexican border was in fair condition Tuesday at Scripps Memorial Hospital in Chula Vista, and her 10-month-old daughter, abandoned near the border, was picked up by her father, authorities said.

Onecima Lopez, 30, was alert after having her left thigh bone, lower right leg and right ankle repaired in surgery, a hospital spokeswoman said. Lopez is in traction and may need further surgery.

Her baby, hospitalized after spending two nights in a sewer pipe near the border, was picked up Tuesday afternoon by Theodore Lopez, a Los Angeles resident who had never seen his daughter before, authorities said.

Sandra Lopez, sporting freshly combed hair and a new pink dress, was holding a white, stuffed panda about the same size as she when her father came to pick her up, said Mark Morelli, spokesman for Children’s Hospital, where Sandra was later transferred.

‘She Looked Like a Doll’

“She looked like a doll, she really did,” Morelli said, “Her dad, he was all smiles. He hugged her and kissed her.” The two are believed to be in Los Angeles.

Meanwhile, U. S. Immigration and Naturalization Service officials said there was a “good chance” that mother and daughter would not be deported.