Shaken Baby In Critical Condition Stirs Police Act Of Compassion

PARK FOREST, IL — A four-month-old baby remains in critical condition after her father shook her so hard she suffered a blunt-force trauma, police said.

Juan Rivera, 22, of Merrillville, Ind., was charged Friday with a Class X felony of aggravated battery to a child and is being held in Will County on a $2 million bond.

Park Forest police said that Rivera took his daughter to Saint Margaret's Hospital in Dyer, Ind., on Jan. 31. because she was in severe distress. Authorities said the distress was consistent with violent shaking and blunt force trauma. Police said they later learned that Rivera caused the girl’s injuries while he was home alone with her at house on the 200 block of Nauvoo Street in Park Forest.

The baby’s long-term prognosis is uncertain, police said.

On Monday, Chief Christopher Mannino released a rare and touching statement that illustrated the effects criminal investigations can have on police.

One of two investigating officers, Justin Rimovsky, bought a teddy bear and dressed it in a t-shirt with the department’s logo. He and his supervisor, Sergeant Darin Studer, brought it to the child’s hospital room and laid it next to her.

The two detectives, Mannino said in an interview, put their personal lives on hold for a week. They get home after their kids go to sleep and leave for work before their spouses get out of bed, he said.

People often think that police are stoic, by-the-book, stick-to-the-facts people, Mannino said, and that is one side of the job. But they're also brothers, fathers, mothers and friends and take some of what they do personally.

"I think we do a disservice in law enforcement when we hold back on some of the issues and do not talk about the personal side of what we do," Mannino said.

He knows from his own experience as an investigator that some cases stay with officers and that it was likely the baby's face would linger in the officers' minds for years to come.

"I know that I went home and hugged my daughter a little harder," he said. She is nine months old.

No one asked the sergeant to bring the baby the teddy bear, Mannino said. The officers just felt compelled to show his compassion to the baby.

Images via Park Forest Police Department.