Baby sitter arrested after death of infant

PROVO — Police arrested a baby sitter for a 7-month-old baby who died from a heart condition Saturday for allegedly failing to call 911 when the child stopped breathing.

The infant boy's parents had gone out to run some errands and left the child, who was on breathing support, in the care of their landlord, 40-year-old Alec Nicolaysen, said Provo Police Sgt. Reed Van Wagoner.

Police said the man called the parents about 5:20 p.m. when the child began crying, but sometime between that call and the time the parents arrived home 10 minutes later, the child had stopped breathing and begun turning blue.

"When the mother came home, she started administering CPR and called 911," Nicolaysen said. But the child was dead.

The mother found the hose connecting oxygen to an air tube through the nose unplugged, Van Wagoner said. The doctor who examined the baby at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center said the child had not had oxygen for some time before emergency crews arrived.

Nicolaysen was arrested for investigation of abuse or neglect of a disabled child. He was booked into Utah County Jail Saturday.

"The child was in distress and on oxygen, and yet he didn't bother to call 911 when the child was turning blue," Van Wagoner said.

— Lana Groves