Owner of NYC day care where toddler fatally ingested fentanyl gets 45 years in prison

Grei Mendez sentenced to 45 years for toddler's fentanyl death, showing remorse but facing consequences for her actions.

A woman who owned a New York City day care centre where a toddler died after ingesting fentanyl has been sentenced to 45 years in prison after pleading guilty to federal drug charges.

Grei Mendez, 37, dropped her head into her crossed arms in anguish as Judge Jed S. Rakoff announced the sentence that triggered sobs among Mendez’s family and the mother whose 22-month-old child, Nicholas Feliz-Dominici, died in September 2023.

Judge Rakoff had previously given the same sentence to Mendez’s husband, Felix Herrera-Garcia, after he pleaded guilty to drug charges and causing bodily harm related to the death. The couple each faced a mandatory minimum of 20 years in prison and a maximum of life for their crimes.

Mendez, 37, had pleaded guilty to drug charges including conspiracy to distribute narcotics resulting in death.

Before the sentence was imposed, she apologized to the families of children who attended the Divino Niño day care that she operated out of a Bronx apartment where the couple stored and packaged narcotics.

“I do want all to know it was an accident,” she said through an interpreter. “I am very sorry. I hope that someday I may be forgiven.”

When the poisoning occurred on September 15, 2023, Feliz-Dominici was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he died. Three other children exposed to the fentanyl at the day care survived after medics administered the overdose-reversing drug Narcan.