The owner of a Bronx daycare where a one-year-old boy died Friday after ingesting fentanyl has been charged with murder.
Grei Mendez, the 36-year-old owner of Divino Nino daycare in the Bronx, was immediately taken in for questioning Friday after the 911 call.
On Saturday evening, the NYPD announced that Mendez and her neighbor, 41-year-old Carlisto Acevedo Brito, have been charged with murder.
The relationship between the two is unknown.
Nicholas Feliz-Dominici had only started daycare for a week before he was found unconscious after a nap.
Three other toddlers are believed to have been exposed to the drugs.
Two two-year-old boys were taken to hospital; one is currently in critical condition, the other is stable. An eight-month-old girl is also listed as stable.
One-year-old Nicholas Feliz-Dominici died Friday after ingesting fentanyl at a Bronx daycare
Police tape is seen outside the Divino Nino Daycare on Morris Avenue in the Bronx
An infection tent could be seen outside the daycare center on Friday afternoon
Mendez opened the Morris Avenue daycare in May. The childcare has a capacity for eight children aged from six weeks to twelve years, the data shows.
The facility underwent an unannounced annual inspection on September 6.
But the NYPD found nearly a kilo of fentanyl in an apartment also used by the daycare, as well as a kilo press — a device typically used to combine fentanyl with cocaine or heroin.
Mendez and Acevedo Brito, that one The New York Post reportedly recently arrived from the Dominican Republic, both face 28 charges, including murder, drug possession, assault, manslaughter and child endangerment.
The dead child’s distraught father, Otoniel Feliz, 32, told DailyMail.com that he and his wife were recommended to use the daycare center.
‘We received a good recommendation. We were told it was a great place. It looked like a nice place,” he told DailyMail.com on Friday.
The tearful father of five, who moved to the United States from the Dominican Republic in 2018, said his child had just started daycare.
“It was his first week,” he said. “This was his first week.”
Otoniel Feliz appeared blue-eyed as he spoke to DailyMail.com outside his apartment
Four children under the age of three “swallowed fentanyl” while on the premises. One of them died
Feliz said he and his wife toured the daycare center when they first dropped off their son.
He said it looked like any other children’s center, with toys and children’s furniture inside.
But after enrolling their son, Feliz and his wife were never allowed back inside. Their son was brought to them by caregivers while the parents waited outside, he claimed.
“Parents are not allowed to enter,” he said.
“You see it the first day, to see where your son will be, but after that you are not allowed to go in anymore.
“They said they don’t want contamination from outside coming in because they keep everything clean, that’s what they said.”
Feliz said his wife went to pick up her son from daycare early Friday afternoon.
When she arrived downtown, she found police tape, emergency services and police.
“My wife called me to tell me our child is going to the hospital,” Feliz said, fighting back tears.
“We thought he was doing well. Ten minutes later my wife called me on the way to the hospital and said he had died.’
All four were taken to hospital, but Nicholas did not survive.
The children had reportedly fallen in for a nap, waking up at 2:30 p.m., and had eaten something about 90 minutes earlier.
When police arrived at the grim scene, all four children were administered the anti-opioid drug Narcan. One of the four responded to the life-saving drug, police said.
Police tape lined the doorway of the building on Saturday as officers on the scene continued their investigation.
Eric Adams, the mayor of New York, expressed his condolences to the family and said he had spoken to the parents who had lost their son.
At a news conference Saturday morning, Adams said the event should serve as a warning to people who have opioids in their homes.
“Seeing the pain that they experience is something that all of us in New York experience and all of us who are parents,” he said.
“This crisis is real and is a real wake-up call for people who have opioids or fentanyl in their homes.”
Sources with knowledge of the investigation confirm that large quantities of drugs were found at the daycare center, as well as a kilo press
The crime scene turned somber as neighbors began to grapple with the tragedy
Anna Ortiz-Irving, 73, lives in the building next to the daycare and says she is ‘sickened’ by what happened
Anna Ortiz-Irving, 73, lives in the building next to the daycare.
She said she was “sickened” by what happened.
“I was amazed because this mother and her daughter are the nicest people,” she told DailyMail.com, referring to the two women who ran the daycare.
“From what I heard, they found fentanyl in the systems of all four babies.”
Oritz-Irving said they “brought the police dogs with them Friday night” and claims her neighbor, who was interpreting for police and the building’s super, “found drug paraphernalia” after getting a warrant to search the daycare.
“They found the cutting machine and what they call a pressing machine,” she said.
Sources with knowledge of the investigation confirm that ‘several medications were found at the daycare center and a kilopers’.
A kilo press is used to package large quantities of medicines.
The National Institute on Drug Abuse describes fentanyl as a powerful synthetic opioid approved by the FDA to treat severe pain.
Over the past decade, fentanyl has been made and distributed illegally, while other illegally manufactured synthetic opioids are increasingly found in the drug supply.
Fentanyl is up to 50 times stronger than heroin and 100 times stronger than morphine, and is increasingly mixed with other illicit drugs – often with deadly consequences.
Drug overdose deaths involving fentanyl increased from 5.7 per 100,000 people in 2016 to 21.6 in 2021.
The Biden administration has urged action as the number of drug-related overdose deaths in the US surpassed 100,000 in 2021.