Baby Dies in Hot Car; Parents Held

Police arrested the parents of a 5-month-old baby who died Monday afternoon in Claremont after being left in a sweltering car for more than six hours.

Kimberly Fudge and Dylan Cutillo, both 29 and of La Habra, were booked on suspicion of felony child abuse and involuntary manslaughter.

The temperature reached 96 in Claremont on Monday, and it was almost 120 inside the car, said Police Lt. Gary Jenkins. When the baby was found, the windows were rolled up.

Police received a call about 2 p.m. from the hysterical mother saying that her baby, Cailan Cutillo, was not breathing. Officers and paramedics were sent to a Howard Johnson motel in the 700 block of South Indian Hill Boulevard.

“Officers responded and found the baby on the bed,” Jenkins said. “The baby had been dead for at least a couple of hours by the time we got there.”

Police took blood samples of the parents to determine if they had taken drugs or had been drinking.

The couple told police that they had an argument at their home Sunday night, Jenkins said. Dylan Cutillo spent the night at the Claremont motel. At 7:30 a.m. Monday, Fudge arrived at the motel to talk to him.

Fudge told authorities she fell asleep and forgot about the baby in the car seat.

When she checked on him, he wasn’t breathing.

No one noticed the infant because the rear windows of the car were darkly tinted, Jenkins said.