Police investigate report of possible dead baby

Las Vegas police are investigating a report of a possible dead baby found in the trash outside a Wal-Mart store at 4505 W. Charleston Blvd. near Valley View Boulevard.

Police said an employee at the store reported seeing what might have been a dead baby in a clear trash bag in a trash can, said Lisa Teele, supervisor of the Metropolitan Police Department's abuse and neglect unit.

"He (the employee) did not open the bag," Teele said.

The employee instead placed the clear bag inside a Wal-Mart bag and put it in a trash bin.

The employee waited 24 hours before reporting the incident, homicide Lt. Lew Roberts said.

By then, the trash had been picked up and taken "to a landfill, which usually means it's under 20 tons of trash," Roberts said.

"We took cadaver dogs out there to search but didn't come up with anything," he said. "We don't know at this point whether it was a fetus or not. It was a significant delay for reporting it."

Roberts said he didn't know why the employee took so long to report the incident to police.

Teele said that police "don't even know what we're looking for because nobody even looked in the bag."

Contact reporter Lynnette Curtis at lcurtis@reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0285.