Mom, grandma arrested after baby tests positive for fentanyl, California cops say
A mother and grandmother have been arrested after a baby girl tested positive for fentanyl, California police say.
Officers responded to a hospital after getting a report of an 11-month-old possibly being exposed to fentanyl shortly before 4 a.m. Monday, July 14, the Santa Rosa Police Department said in a July 15 Facebook post.
An investigation determined the 35-year-old mother brought her four children, ages 11 months to 9 years, to visit her mother’s Santa Rosa apartment on July 13, police said
The family was in the apartment together “for several hours” with the 54-year-old grandmother, police said.
McClatchy News is not identifying the women to protect the identity of the child.
As the older children were in a room with their grandmother, the baby girl “was on the floor of a bedroom with (her mother) nearby,” police said.
At some point during their visit, “the baby picked up a small, white substance that (the mother) feared may have been fentanyl,” and she told the grandmother, police said.
The grandmother then “administered Narcan to the baby to prevent a possible overdose,” but police said neither of the women called 911.
The “women monitored the baby for overdose symptoms briefly,” then the mother left the apartment with her four children, police said.
About five hours later, police said, the mother brought the baby to a hospital, where “a preliminary medical examination determined the baby had been exposed to fentanyl.”
After getting a search warrant, detectives searched the apartment, and “numerous pieces of narcotics paraphernalia, much of it stained with suspected narcotics residue, as well as pills, methamphetamine, and black tar heroin, were located inside the apartment,” police said.
Many of the items were found on the bedroom floor “where the baby had been crawling and on surfaces easily accessible by the children,” police said.
Detectives concluded that the mother and grandmother “were responsible for the baby’s fentanyl exposure,” police said.
The mother was booked into jail on a felony count of child endangerment, while the grandmother was booked into jail on the same count, along with “one misdemeanor count of possession of drug paraphernalia,” police said.
Child Protective Services took over caring for the four children, including the baby who was treated for fentanyl at the hospital and later released, police said.
Santa Rosa is about a 55-mile drive north from San Francisco.
This story was originally published July 16, 2025 at 12:06 PM with the headline "Mom, grandma arrested after baby tests positive for fentanyl, California cops say."
