Girl, 6, Burned While Playing With Lighter
UPDATED 12/13/11 11:29 a.m.
CHICAGO (CBS) -- A 6-year-old girl remained hospitalized as of midday Tuesday, after setting herself on fire as she played with a Bic lighter.
As CBS 2's Susanna Song reports, the young girl was left with second-degree burns on 10 to 15 percent of her body. She was playing with the lighter in her grandmother's bedroom around 10:30 p.m. Monday at the family's home in the 1600 block of North Laramie Avenue in the North Austin neighborhood.
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Police say the girl's shirt caught on fire, and she ended up being burned by the flames. She ran out of the bedroom and into the kitchen, where her father put out the fire with water from the sink, according to police News Affairs Officer Laura Kubiak.
The girl was taken to Stroger Hospital of Cook County, with what the Fire Department described as critical burns. But she was reported in stable condition as of midday Tuesday.
Neighbors say the incident is a tragedy all around.
"I came over to say a prayer for her or something, but they said they took her to the hospital," said a neighbor, the Rev. Cole Lenell. "When I hear something like this, somebody needs to be watching her closer."
"I see her out playing a lot in the summertime. I know that she plays out here with all the kids," said neighbor Angel Hayward. "It kind of hits home. Make sure you get the lighters out of the kids' reach and all that."
Early Tuesday morning, Song spoke with the girl's mother and grandmother when they returned home from Stroger Hospital of Cook County. They were distraught and declined to go on camera, but said the girl would recover.
The Sun-Times Media Wire contributed to this report.
