Baby Found Safe in Sewer After Mother Struck by Car

A 10-month-old girl apparently spent two nights in a sewer pipe near the Mexican border after her mother was hit by a car while crossing Interstate 5 with a group of about 20 illegal aliens, police said Sunday.

The child, wrapped in a yellow blanket, was being carried by another member of the group, but apparently was abandoned after her mother, Onecima Lopez, 30, was struck Friday evening by a hit-and-run driver, police said.

“She thought they were going to deliver her daughter to a relative in Los Angeles, but they didn’t,” said Bill Robinson, a spokesman for the San Diego Police Department. “We don’t know why the child was abandoned.”

Lopez’s companions apparently continued north, leaving her near the highway and placing the baby in the sewer pipe nearby, Robinson said.

Another Group Member Killed

Another member of the group, Antonio Mendez, 54, was struck and killed by the same car that hit Lopez, Young said. The identity of the driver is not known and the vehicle, which was southbound on the freeway, was described only as red, Young said.

Lopez suffered two broken legs, but managed to crawl to a highway over-crossing at Dairy Mart Road after she was struck and spent Friday night under the structure, according to Officer Randy Young of the California Highway Patrol. She was found Saturday morning by a passer-by.

But her daughter, Sandra, was not found until Sunday morning, by another group of aliens making their way north. They took the child and some formula that had been placed nearby and flagged down a passing cabdriver, who delivered the baby to the police station on San Ysidro Boulevard, Robinson said. Police officers fed the child some formula and rushed her to Scripps Hospital in Chula Vista, where doctors found her dehydrated but in remarkably good condition.

Lopez was in fair condition in the hospital’s intensive care unit Sunday and was expected to undergo surgery today, according to Judy Casto, nursing supervisor. Casto said Lopez had a joyous reunion Sunday with her daughter, who was later transferred to Children’s Hospital, where she was to be observed for a day or two.

CHP officers had searched for the child Saturday after Lopez contacted her relatives in Los Angeles and learned that the baby had not arrived, but were unable to find her, police said.

After the baby was located Sunday morning, police showed Lopez a snapshot of the child and she identified it as hers, Robinson said.

The case will be turned over to immigration authorities, who must decide whether to deport Lopez and her child, who are from the state of Michoacan in the interior of Mexico.

Increasing Problem

The incident also points up the increasingly serious problem of illegal aliens who are maimed or killed as they dash across border-area highways at night. The traffic accidents have become a top priority with the CHP, which reports several such deaths each month. A record 10 deaths of undocumented aliens occurred in October.

While most border cities have similar problems, the situation in the San Diego area is particularly serious.

The large number of pedestrians who cross the border near San Diego, and the major California freeway systems that run to the Mexican border, combine to cause an unusually high death and injury rate. Many of the cases are hit-and-run incidents in which the drivers are never located, police say. Sometimes the bodies are so badly mangled that the victims are never identified.