CHICAGO — A toddler is in critical condition after he was found with life-threatening burns in South Shore Thursday night.
The severely burned boy, four months shy of turning 2, was found by officers in the 6900 block of South Cornell Avenue around 8 p.m. Thursday. The circumstances of the incident are still unclear, said Officer Hector Alfaro, a police spokesman.
The boy was taken in critical condition to Comer Children's Hospital.
Police are investigating the incident, Alfaro said. The Department of Children and Family Services is also investigating, a spokeswoman said. No other children were in the household, she said.
Thursday evening, the mother of the boy knocked frantically on the door of an apartment above theirs demanding to use their phone to call police, a neighbor said.
"She told [the police] 'There's something wrong with my baby and they need to hurry up and get here,'" said the neighbor, who would only identify herself as Tasha. She asked the woman if she needed any help, but the woman refused, saying the police would arrive soon.
Upstairs neighbor Rosemary Carter was having a normal day until she saw police, ambulances and fire trucks parked outside her apartment building Thursday.
"I was home all day and didn't hear or see anything out of the ordinary," Carter said noting she can normally hear the baby moving around downstairs.
The tenants of the apartment were new, Carter said, and she only talked to them in passing, never finding the time to catch their names. She said the man, woman and a young baby who occupied the apartment seemed nice when they spoke.
"It's really sad," Carter said. "My prayers go out to the family."
