Infant Girl Falls Into Swimming Pool, Drowns : Fatal: Child slips into algae-covered water near Anaheim and dies despite efforts to revive her.

A 16-month-old girl fell into the stagnant water of an unfenced swimming pool and drowned Thursday afternoon, sheriff’s deputies reported.

The child, Jenny Alisa Alverez, stumbled into the pool at 9242 Picadilly Way about 2 p.m. and was pronounced dead at Martin Luther Hospital at 2:58 p.m., Sheriff’s Lt. Richard J. Olson said. The baby was pulled from the algae-covered pool by her mother, Olson said.

The mother, who was not identified, and a man living at the single-story stucco house attempted to give the child cardiopulmonary resuscitation, Olson said. The man then called paramedics.

No charges were filed in the case, Olson said.

Olson said the mother and daughter had been staying at the house as guests for about two weeks. The identity of the family she was staying with was not available, Olson said.

However, a 9-year-old girl who identified herself as Roxanne Lamas said she lives at the house. She told reporters that Jenny’s mother had gone to the bathroom “and when she came out, the baby was outside. I guess Jenny had pushed open the door.”

Olson said there was no fence around the pool in the back yard. He said that there was so much algae covering the pool water that “it would be hard to recognize it as a swimming pool.”

The neighborhood where the accident occurred is in a small island of county territory between the cities of Anaheim and Fullerton. Picadilly Way is near the intersections of the Santa Ana and Riverside freeways.

Following the accident, sheriff’s deputies cordoned off the house and small front yard with yellow tape as the investigation proceeded. Neighborhood children flocked to the scene, watching deputies and news reporters, but most adults stayed indoors and declined to comment.

One neighbor, who asked not to be identified, said Thursday night: “No one around here knows much about the families in that house because they keep to themselves. They’re nice people, but they just keep to themselves. There’s more than one family who lives in the house, but I don’t know their names. From time to time, I saw the baby girl when she was outside, and she was just a real pretty little child.”

Thursday’s death was at least the 11th drowning, in either a swimming pool or spa, of a child under age 7 in Orange County this year, according to the coroner’s office. A coroner’s spokesman said an exact tally is not possible because some deaths are still under investigation. In some of those cases, drowning has not been finally ruled as the cause of death.

According to Orange County epidemiologist Hildy Meyers, an average of 11 children drown in swimming pools or spas in the county each year, with an average of 90 other children hospitalized annually from near-drownings in pools and spas.