ROCHESTER, N.Y. — A 1-year-old baby boy was found dead in November inside a closet in his mother’s apartment at Manhattan Square in downtown Rochester.

The mother, 34-year-old Passion Anderson, is charged with murder.  

When police shared the details on how the baby died, Chief Investigative Reporter Berkeley Brean walked the block from News10NBC’s station to the apartment building and talked to people who live there.

Manhattan Square Apartment is the tall apartment building next to the skating rink at MLK Park. 

Police say the baby boy died because he didn’t have enough nutritional food to eat and didn’t have enough to drink.   

Berkeley highlighted the parts of the report that describe what happened — including the baby being found “inside of a closet” and dying because of “malnourishment and dehydration.” 

“I think she should have given the child up if she was going to do this to the child. The child would have been better off in a foster home,” says resident Michael Jopek.

“It’s terrible,” resident Denise Espinosa says. “She could have got help from somewhere.”

The mother is at Rochester General Hospital and was arraigned Monday in the hospital on a murder charge. The charge says she showed “depraved indifference” to her baby boy. 

This is the second murder case involving a 1-year-old baby in Rochester this year. 

In January, Bryasia Love was charged with killing her son. That trial starts in June 2024. 

At Manhattan Square, Naimah Anderson told Berkeley she used to work in Child Protective Services. 

“I think somewhere along the line we’re failing the children,” Naimah says. “That it’s a social issue. People want to talk about money, but it’s social issues. It’s the lack of ability of parenting and it started decades ago.”

The next court date in this case is January 4.