A 33-year-old New York woman was arrested on charges of second-degree murder and manslaughter Tuesday night, hours after allegedly tossing her newborn daughter out of a seven-story window.
NYPD officers said the infant's umbilical cord was still attached when they found her in a Bronx apartment courtyard. An autopsy revealed she died of blunt force trauma, meaning that the baby was still alive when her mother, Jennifer Berry, threw her from a 7th-floor window.
"She gave birth to an 8-pound girl and dropped the newborn seven stories to the pavement. The medical examiner has determined that the baby was alive," Assistant District Attorney Georgia Barker told the court during Berry's arraignment. "There was air in the lungs, this was a healthy baby girl."
Berry remained stone-faced as she was led past reporters and into a Bronx police station. According to the New York Times, she initially denied knowing the infant but eventually confessed to giving birth in her apartment shower. The infant's tiny body remained unnoticed until the building superintendent's wife cleaned through an alleyway.
Berry's boyfriend said he was in another room when the incident happened and wasn't aware that she was even pregnant. Police said he isn't facing charges.
Sources told the New York Daily News that Berry lost a child to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome years earlier. The former New York City child welfare worker made repeated hospital visits after giving birth in 2008 before the newborn passed away. She worked for the city about six months before leaving for undisclosed reasons.
The case is adjourned until Oct. 5 while Berry is held without bail.
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