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Police: Baby Thrown In Snow Bank

By Reg Chapman, WCCO-TV

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- A newborn was cared for in a hospital Saturday night after witnesses said the mother threw the baby in the snow.

The baby was only wearing a T-shirt and was wrapped in a blanket.

The mother, 21-year-old Ashley Couch, is accused of throwing her infant in a snow bank near Chicago Avenue and 18th Street Saturday morning.

Eddie is one of the men who witnessed what happened.

Eddie said he was walking from Minneapolis at around 8 a.m., crossing the Chicago Avenue Bridge when he noticed the young woman.

"Like a major league baseball player in a windup - that's how hard she threw the child," Eddie said.

Eddie said he and another man named Keith were on the bridge. It was Keith who first noticed Ashley Couch as he got off the bus.

He was the one who told Eddie to watch and make sure the mother did not throw the child over the rail and into on-coming traffic below.

"She had already thrown her child down hard on the hard compacted ice. She then picked it up and walked around 18th and threw it down again about a hundred feed down the sidewalk. And this time she turned her back and walked away, abandoned her child," Eddie said.

That was when Keith picked the child up, held her in his arms and called police, Eddie said.

Eddie said Couch walked back towards them and tried to pry the child from Keith's arms.

She gave both men an explanation for throwing her 18-day-old child in the snow.

Eddie said that Couch was angry because there was no milk in the house, and her boyfriend would not go out and get any.

Police said Couch had just gotten in a fight with her boyfriend, Deontae Thurmond, at their home a few blocks away.

Officers said Thurmond ran off and Couch was trying to follow him when she abandoned her daughter in the snow.

The baby girl was taken to Hennepin County Medical Center (HCMC). Couch and Thurmond were taken to jail.

Thurmond was arrested for domestic assault, Couch for child neglect.

The baby girl was taken to HCMC in critical condition. She is expected to survive.

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