A 21-year-old Lawrenceville man who police say abandoned his 5-month-old daughter to die in the woods near his home was arrested Thursday morning at a Gwinnett County hotel.
The Gwinnett Sheriff’s Fugitive Unit tracked Rayvon Lamont Gray to the Suburban Lodge at Satellite Boulevard and Ga. 120, according to sheriff’s spokeswoman Stacey Bourbonnais. The man had purchased a room there for the next five days.
“He was alone inside the room and offered no resistance to sheriff’s deputies” when they found him shortly before 11 a.m., Bourbonnais said in an email.
Gray was being held without bond in Gwinnett County Jail.
Arrest warrants obtained by the Gwinnett County Police Department charge Gray, of the 500 block of James Road, with domestic violence battery, reckless conduct and cruelty to children in connection with the Monday incident.
Police were familiar with Gray and the mother of his child, having been called to their home in the past in response to domestic spats between them, a police report of the incident indicated.
Officers were back again about midday Monday after Gray’s mother, who heard the couple arguing, called for help. The 37-year-old woman told the officers that she was so frightened, she had grabbed a large kitchen knife to defend herself before fleeing to her car to call police.
The couple had been arguing over a phone number written on a piece of paper, and the 19-year-old woman accused Gray of having punched her in the stomach and face, police said. By the time officers arrived, the man had left the house with their infant daughter.
Officers checked the area and found the child by herself, clad only in thin pajamas and lying face down along a path in a densely wooded area more than 300 yards from the house.
The child’s attire “would likely have resulted in her death as there is an abundance of wildlife in the area and the nighttime temperatures would drop significantly,” the police report stated. “It appeared Rayvon had left his 5-month-old daughter to die out in the woods alone with no one to take care of her.”
Medical personnel called to the scene checked the child and found no bites or injuries, police said. The girl had been missing for about 30 minutes. Her mother declined offers for her and the girl to be taken to the hospital.
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