The owner of a New Britain day care is facing charges accusing her of spanking a 20-month-old child on the leg.
Luz Marina Correa said she meant the baby no harm.
The 62-year-old woman said she ran a licensed daycare called Travesuras Day Care Home from her Smalley Street house in New Britain.
She voluntarily surrendered her license on October 17, two days after New Britain police began an investigation into an incident at the day care.
On Wednesday, Correa was charged with risk of injury to a child and third-degree assault.
"I picked him up to put him where I change his diaper. So I got scared because when I bent down to grab the diaper, he made an abrupt movement. I thought he was about to fall. It scared me and my reaction, I don’t know why, was to spank him," Correa said.
Correa said she told the victim’s mother what happened when she came to pick up her child on October 13.
Local
Police said on October 15 the mother contacted police after noticing what appeared to be a hand print on the baby’s leg.
"I did it without malice, without intention. Like I said, I was scared because I thought he was going to fall. I was scared. So I reacted that way and that’s why I apologized many times," Correa said.
Tony Antonia owns the home Correa is renting and was shocked to hear the news and called her a good person.
"I go in the house I see the kids nice and its clean. The food they take care. I see all of that. I (didn't) see anything I no see nothing," Antonia said.
NBC Connecticut reached out to the child’s mother who declined to comment.
Correa is scheduled to be arraigned in court on November 15.
Correa is of Colombian decent and doesn’t speak English so NBC Conneciticut’s Catalina Trivino spoke to her in Spanish to get her account of what happened.
