A 3-year-old boy who was pushed into Lake Michigan off Navy Pier has died, according to the medical examiner’s office.
Josiah Brown, 3, was pronounced dead at 10:16 a.m. Sunday, the Cook County medical examiner’s office said.
Authorities say Josiah was pushed into Lake Michigan on Sept. 19 by his aunt Victoria Moreno. Moreno then stood by as he sank below the water, where divers found him about 30 minutes later, Cook County prosecutors said. The boy was rushed to Lurie Children’s Hospital in very critical condition.
Moreno was denied bail at her court hearing despite defense arguments that she suffers from mental health issues. Moreno, 34, is charged with attempted first-degree murder and aggravated battery to a child.
Moreno initially told responding officers that she was only a witness, then claimed she was holding the boy’s shirt and let go because he “was acting up,” according to a police report and a source with knowledge of the investigation.
Moreno had slipped out of the family home in Des Plaines with the boy in the morning while another aunt went to wake up her kids and his grandmother went to change, according to prosecutors.
Moreno “stole the keys” to the family’s truck and “snuck out of the residence without anyone knowing that she had left,” prosecutors said. The other aunt no longer heard the boy talking “and became alarmed,” prosecutors said. That’s when she noticed Moreno and the boy were gone and the truck was missing.
Neighbors of the family said the boy’s father has a medical issue that required him to be taken out by stretchers and ambulances several times over the last few weeks. The father, Dantrell Brown, posted on social media about his diagnosis of congestive heart failure three years ago at age 22, just days before the birth of his son.
Contributing: Tom Schuba, David Struett.
