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Grei Mendez De Ventura, 36, the owner of Divino Niño Daycare, and her alleged accomplice, Carlisto Acevedo Brito, 41, were charged by the federal government on Sept. 19 with possession with the intent and conspiracy to distribute drugs resulting in death.
Meanwhile, a manhunt continued for De Ventura’s fugitive husband, who was identified as the leader of the drug operation.
Children who napped where the defendants were cutting up drugs apparently inhaled fentanyl particles kicked into the air, authorities said. The exposure killed young Nicholas Feliz Dominici, who’d been at the center for only a week.
Three other youngsters — a pair of 2-year-old boys and one of their 8-month-old sisters — were also hospitalized, police said. One of the boys was in critical condition, they said.
Narcan reportedly had to be administered to at least one of them.
“I spoke with the dad of the baby we lost,” Mayor Eric Adams told reporters on Tuesday. “I went to the hospital that night to speak with the mom and dad of the three that were there. One of the babies, they were in one of the cribs next door from his sibling. And just looking at that baby laying on that crib -- it rips your heart out.”
“Tragedy doesn’t begin to describe the events that took place at Divino Niño Daycare,” added DEA New York Special Agent-in-Charge Frank A. Tarentino III. “This death and drug poisonings are every parent’s worst nightmare.
“Fentanyl kills indiscriminately, and the defendants’ callous and irresponsible disregard to safety led to two of the most heinous acts imaginable," Tarentino said.
Records show the city licensed the daycare center as a home-based business on Morris Avenue near East 196th St. in the Fordham Manor sections of the Bronx on May 16 of this year. The total city-permitted capacity was eight children ages 6 weeks through 12 years, with one caregiver mandated for every child under two years old.
City records also show that there was a surprise inspection on Sept. 6, during which “no violations” were reportedly found.
The inspectors returned on Monday and produced a list of 20 violations that they said hadn’t been corrected.
These include not taking “suitable precautions” to “eliminate all conditions in areas accessible to children which pose a safety or health hazard and/or in which a child could be injured or killed," leaving children without “competent supervision” and not immediately notifying parents of a serious injury to their children.
The conspirators launched the operation in July, federal authorities charged.
In addition to “large quantities” of fentanyl, investigators said, the crew had “purpose-built” processing tools, including kilo presses that are used before the operators combine it with other drugs such as heroin or cocaine.
De Ventura and her husband were reportedly recorded on a surveillance camera fleeing the apartment through a back door carrying bags of apparent evidence a short time before she dialed 911 on Friday to seek medical help for the children.
The time wasted likely cost young Nicholas his life, authorities said.
Investigators accompanied by uniformed officers a short time later discovered a kilo of fentanyl “in an area that was used to give the children naps,” NYPD Chief of Detectives Joe Kenny said.
The fentanyl was 'laying underneath a mat where children had been sleeping earlier,” Kenny told reporters.
“One grain, two grains of fentanyl can take down a grown man,” the chief of detectives said, “so even the residue itself for a small child would cause death.”
Both De Ventura and Brito were already being held without bail on state charges that include manslaughter, depraved indifference to murder and criminal drug possession when federal authorities stepped in.
Working the case are a number of law enforcement agencies at all levels of government united under one banner.
These include the DEA, NYPD, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York’s Digital Forensic Unit and the New York/New Jersey High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area
Also involved is the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF), a special crime-fighting unit made up of federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies that which focuses on “disrupting and dismantling the most significant drug traffickers, money launderers, gangs, and transnational criminal organizations.”
Members include not only the DEA, HIDTA, Homeland Security Investigations, U.S. Customs and Border Protection and IRS-Criminal Investigation but also the Bergen County prosecutor’s and sheriff’s offices, the Palisades Interstate Parkway Police, and police from Fort Lee, Hackensack, Englewood, Teaneck, Closter, Saddle River, Hillsdale, Northvale, River Vale and Hawthorne.
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