A Manhattan attorney jumped from her eighth floor Upper Manhattan apartment with her baby in her arms Wednesday morning.
Cynthia Wachenheim, 45, died on impact with the ground but, miraculously, her 10-month-old son Keston survived the impact, DNAinfo reports.
Wachenheim held the baby to her chest before she leaped. As she hit the ground, the boy bounced off her chest and started crying. A passerby ran to pick the infant up just as police and emergency responders arrived.
The attorney, known to friends as “Cindy”, leaped from an eighth story window of The Sutton building on West 147th street, at about 3:25 p.m., after arguing with her husband. Police believe he left the building before she jumped.
“I heard a small scream when she was in the air, and then I heard a nasty bang,” neighbor Steven Dominguez, 18, told DNAinfo.com. “It sounded like a big piece of wood hitting the ground.”
Dominguez’s mother, Adelina Dominguez, 45, ran to the wailing infant to pick him up.
“I saw the baby on the ground and I tried to pick it up, to comfort it, but the police told me not to,” she said.
Wachenheim started working as an associate attorney for the New York State Supreme Court in 1997. She recently took a leave of absence.
“All of us in the court family are saddened by this tragic incident,” said David Bookstaver, a courts spokesman. “Our thoughts are with her family during this difficult time.”
“They looked like a really happy family,” said neighbor Yaa Dwamney, 32. “I never would have thought she would be dead.”
