Infant Gets Locked In Niagara Falls Hotel Safe When Hide-And-Seek Game Goes Terribly Wrong

Earlier Tuesday morning, two Asian parents, who police officials believe to be from Brooklyn, New York, called the maintenance worker at a Howard Johnson hotel in Niagara Falls about their newborn infant being locked in the hotel safe, according to NY Daily News. They later uncovered that it was a sibling case of hide-and-seek gone wrong.

When the maintenance worker arrived at their hotel room, he could hear the newborn baby screaming from inside the hotel safe. He unlocked the safe by entering the code and rescued the child who was unharmed. Investigators believe that the newborn baby was locked in the hotel safe for at least 20 minutes.

After the baby was freed, the police were called to the hotel, but the parents – whose names have not been released — checked out of their room before they could be interviewed. Local police then went public with the incident, asking if anyone had any information regarding the child locked in the hotel safe. They were instructed to call crime stoppers anonymous, according to the Huffington Post.

Detective Scott Kraushar, with Niagara Regional Police explained the call for information.

“We are not anticipating charges at this time. But we need to speak to the family to answer questions and ensure the welfare of the infant. There is no information on how the baby ended up locked in the safe.”

“It was quite traumatizing for the hotel workers, finding this infant in the safe like that,” he added. “The maintenance worker was quite shaken up.”

Eventually, they were able to “interview the people involved and determined that she’s safe,” said Detective Constable Amanda Sanders of the Niagara Regional Police Child Abuse Unit. “An older sibling helped her get into the safe and pressed a couple buttons on it and didn’t know how to open it again.”

“The parents immediately went out and tried to find some staff members to assist them to get the child out which ultimately resulted in a positive end. They’ve been cooperative ever since we’ve gotten a hold of them.

“We were concerned of the welfare of the baby. There’s no criminality involved as it was an accident.”

After interviewing the newborn’s parents, they uncovered that the child being locked in the safe was a sibling case of hide-and-seek gone wrong. One of the older children was playing the game and decided to hide the newborn in the hotel safe. After closing the door, she pressed a few buttons and it locked.

When the parents discovered what the child had done, they tried desperately to unlock the safe but were unsuccessful — that’s when they called for the maintenance worker to free the child.

The newborn baby is safe and in the care of her parents; police officials concluded that the baby was locked in the hotel safe by accident and there was no “criminality involved.”

[Image courtesy of E.C. Johnson / Flickr / Creative Commons]