Cop breaks window to save baby

CAMDEN – Two Camden County police officers smashed a car window to reach a screaming, sweating baby left in a locked car outside a downtown CVS Thursday, authorities said.

The rescue of a 5-month-old boy shortly before noon, which occurred as the temperature climbed into the 70s, was one of two life-saving interventions on the 500 block of Mickle Boulevard.

A different pair of officers — one of them Chief Scott Thomson — came to the aid of a man who fell unconscious from an apparent drug overdose near the CVS around two hours later. That man was revived with Narcan, police said.

The day's drama began when a woman approached Officer Belinda Villegas-Ramos, who was working in uniform on a secondary, or private, assignment in a TD Bank at Mickle and 5th Street.

The woman told Villegas-Ramos a baby was crying in a locked car in the adjacent CVS parking lot. The temperature inside the car was not known, but according to Consumer Reports, a car's interior can reach 120 degrees when the outside temperature is in the 70s.

"I just thought about getting that baby out of the vehicle and getting him to a safe area," said Villegas-Ramos, who called in the situation to police headquarters as she hurried to the car.

Villegas-Ramos tried to break the driver's-side window with her flashlight, but could only create spiderweb cracks. Officer Joseph McGrath, who arrived moments later in response to Villegas-Ramos' call, smashed the glass into pieces with his nightstick.

"I guess I hit it in the right spot," he said after the rescue.

Villegas-Ramos scooped up the baby, rushed him into the air-conditioned bank, and partially undressed the child to cool him. An ambulance then took the boy to nearby Cooper University Hospital, where he was found to be in good condition.

McGrath said the boy's mother, 30-year-old Deonna Moore of Sicklerville, emerged shortly after the baby's rescue. "She was mad about the window being broken," he noted.

"She said she just went into the CVS for two seconds," said McGrath, who noted the joint rescue effort had taken several minutes.

Moore was charged with child endangerment and also was found to have four outstanding warrants from Camden and Winslow. She was held in Camden County Jail in lieu of $50,000 bail.

The baby was released from Cooper to the custody of the state Division of Child Protection and Permanency.

"This was a poor judgment call on her part," Villegas-Ramos said of the mother. "She's going to need some kind of help. Hopefully, she'll learn from this."

As the two officers conducted an informal press conference outside the TD Bank, police lights flashed on for the nearby drug overdose.

Officer Stephen Bezich said he was on foot patrol near the Rand Transportaton Center when a woman alerted him to an unconscious man lying face-down on the Mickle Boulevard sidewalk. Like Villegas-Ramos, Bezich reported the incident — and his call drew the attention of the department's chief, who was driving nearby.

Thomson came to the scene with Narcan and instructed Bezich on how to administer the anti-overdose medication. Once revived, the overdose victim was also taken to Cooper.

Reach Jim Walsh at jwalsh@courierpostonline.com or (856) 486-2646. Tweet him at jimwalsh_cp