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Baby Dead in Apparent Murder-Suicide Attempt: 'The Lady Killed My Son'

By  Patty Wetli and Emily Morris | May 30, 2013 12:31pm | Updated on May 30, 2013 7:19pm

 Kimberlynn Bolanos was charged with murdering her 5-month-old son, Isaac Bolanos at the Diplomat Motel.
Infant Slain at Diplomat Motel
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LINCOLN SQUARE — An infant boy was killed and his mother was seriously injured in what appears to be a murder-suicide attempt in a Lincoln Square motel, police said.

The boy was found in a room in the Diplomat Motel, 5230 N. Lincoln Ave., about 10:30 a.m., Chicago police and fire officials said. Unconfirmed reports suggested the infant had been stabbed, said Officer Michael Sullivan, a Chicago Police Department spokesman.

The mother was taken in serious condition to a local hospital, officials said. The child was identified by the Cook County Medical Examiner's Office as 5-month-old Isaac Bolanos. He was pronounced dead at Swedish Covenant Hospital at 10:55 a.m., the medical examiner's office said.

Police are investigating the case as a homicide, Sullivan said. Authorities did not confirm the age of the mother.

According to a front desk clerk at the Diplomat, who asked to remain anonymous, a man approached her after 10 a.m. this morning, asking her to call 911.

"Call the police. The lady killed my son, the lady killed my son," the clerk said the man shouted.

According to the clerk, the couple checked into the motel two days ago.

Chicago police detective and forensic units were on the scene, with police tape cordoning off the entire north section of the motel. The incident appeared to have occurred in a first-floor room.

Lily Grey, a frequent guest at the Diplomat, was staying in a room one floor up and about three doors down from the victim's.

"I didn't hear no screaming," said Grey, who has since changed rooms.

"It makes me hurt, I can't believe that happened. I got six [children] of my own," she said. "I'm just freaked out a lady could do that to a little baby."

The Diplomat is part of a two-mile stretch of Lincoln Avenue known as "Motel Row," once a thriving corridor for travelers in the pre-Interstate Highway days.

In more recent years, neighbors say, the motels have attracted a less savory crowd, developing a reputation as a hangout for prostitutes and drug dealers, despite the presence of the 20th District Police headquarters at 5400 N. Lincoln Ave.

"[The motels] being clustered here, it invites more bad business than anything positive," one local resident, who did not want to be identified, said. "It doesn't invite anything good."