Health & Medicine

Dead Fetus Discovered From a 17-Year-Old Shoplifter after Getting Busted by Security Guard

Nupur Jha
First Posted: Oct 18, 2013 10:28 AM EDT

A security guard at Victoria's Secret in Herald Square, New York , busted 17-year-old Tiona Rodriguez from Brooklyn, for shoplifting and found that she was carrying a dead fetus hidden in a bag.

This disturbing revelation was made on Thursday, Oct.17, when Rodriguez along with her friend, Francis Estevez, 17, from Queens were held on suspicion of shoplifting lingerie from the store. Rodriguez is already a mother of a two-year old boy.

On getting arrested, she told the cops that she underwent a miscarriage a day before and did not know what to do with the fetus.

A cop revealed that she went into labor at six and a half months into her pregnancy, according to a Daily News report. "She said she didn't know what to do," the source said.

Rodriguez was then taken to Bellevue Hospital on a wheelchair and the fetus was removed along with other crucial evidences. The cops found that the fetus was a boy, wrapped in a plastic bag covered by clothes.

There were mixed reactions from other customers shopping at the popular lingerie store after they found out about the fetus. Most of them sympathized with the teenage mother.

"She must be going through a big depression. She must have been wondering how she was going to get rid of it," said Yvonne Sonera.

Her friend Francis Estevez was taken to the Midtown South Precinct stationhouse for further investigation.

The cops searched Rodriguez's bedroom for evidence about her miscarriage. She had posted an update on Facebook about being cramped up with periods just a day before this incident took place. Her update was: "These Cramps SON"

The teenager's neighbors were shocked on hearing about this incident, they were unaware of her pregnancy.

"I've known her since she was little. She was probably nervous and didn't know what to do. She would never hurt anyone," one of her neighbors, Zami Ford, 17 told Daily News Report.

Her dead fetus was sent for a post mortem to find out whether it was alive at birth. The duo, Rodriguez and Estevez have been accused of criminal possession of stolen property and petty larceny.

"She had to have hidden that pregnancy for a while. I saw her outside here the other day with her family, and her baby. There was a whole bunch of joy. You would never know there were any problems," said Lydia Perez, another neighbor of Rodriguez.

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