Timelines 12/19/13

Mother of “Baby Angel” indicted for murder
The mother of “Baby Angel,” a male infant found at a recycling plant after being dumped in a recycling bin, was indicted on second-degree murder charges by a Rockland County Grand Jury on Monday. Maria Oliva Guaman-Guaman, 23 of Spring Valley, was arrested last week after DNA tests confirmed she was the mother of the infant, who was found dead of strangulation at the Brookfield Recycling Plant in Elmsford. The Grand Jury indicted Guaman-Guaman that afternoon and she remains in police custody with no bail. Police were able to use lottery tickets found with the body to pinpoint the approximate location of a convenience store near the suspect and conducted DNA canvassing to identify related individuals. Once she was identified and questioned, Guaman-Guaman allegedly told police she kept her pregnancy secret and killed the newborn because she did not want another child. The family of Guaman-Guaman stated they did not know about the pregnancy and would have helped support her financially once the child was born. The defendant also has a two and a half year old daughter who was placed in foster care following her mother’s arrest.

Man shot dead at Short Hill Mall
A Hoboken man was shot and killed in a carjacking on Sunday night at the Short Hills Mall in New Jersey in a case which might be indirectly connected to a suspected car theft ring. Patent attorney Dustin Friedland, 30, was returning to his car with his wife at around 9 p.m. when two men threatened him with guns drawn weapons as he approached the driver’s side door. Though his wife was unharmed, he was shot before he entered the vehicle and died at Morristown Medican Center at 11:45 p.m. The thieves escaped with the car, which was later found on Renner Avenue, a location police said is often used by a carjacking ring as a drop off point for stolen vehicles. A $10,000 reward has been offered for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the killers.

Helicopter crash in Afghanistan kills 6 soldiers
In the deadliest single day in Afghanistan since June, six soldiers were killed and one was injured when their helicopter crashed in southern Afghanistan. The Black Hawk UH-60 crashed at about 2 p.m. on Tuesday in an undisclosed location in Afghanistan’s Zabul Province. The cause of the crash has not been determined, but the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) the men were a part of stated no reports of enemy activity were given in that particular area. The ISAF is an international force comprised of soldiers from various nations, but a U.S. Defense official indicated all the men onboard were Americans. Earlier in June, seven Georgian soldiers with the ISAF were killed in a suicide bombing. About 180 aircraft were reported to have crashed in Afghanistan since NATO began operating in the area, mostly due to accidents caused by malfunctions or difficulty in navigating the uneven high-altitude terrain.

Two arrests reported at West Nyack DWI checkpoint
A DWI checkpoint near Crosfield Avenue on Route 59 resulted in several arrests of New York and New Jersey residents who were found to have been driving impaired. Roberta Mendez of Ridgefield, N.J. and Lynn Rawdon of Congers were both arrested on misdemeanor DWI charges after failing field sobriety tests. Additionally, Bezrok Tasy of Wayne, N.J., and Alison D. Rodda and Jason Whitfield of Spring Valley were also charged with misdemeanor DWI. Rodda was also charged with unlawful possession of marijuana, a violation, and Whitfield was discovered to have had an outstanding warrant in Spring Valley.