It was an open secret that the Bronx day-care center where a tot died from suspected fentanyl exposure was operating as a drug front, a neighbor told The Post on Monday — raising crucial questions about how the site managed to pass a state inspection just days before.
Divino Nino Daycare owner Grei Mendez De Ventura, 36, put a business sign outside the basement space in the Kingsbridge building touting the day-care site more than a year ago — yet there were never any kids going in and out, claimed a woman who lives next door.
“We all said, ‘Drugas.’ How could you not know?” said the longtime resident, 69, who declined to give her name. “It was a day-care for a year with no children. For one year, she had a day-care with no children but people go in. But no babies?
“A day-care with no children and men coming in and out. Yes, we knew something. We knew something, something was not good happening there,” the woman said.
The neighbor claimed Ventura wouldn’t even allow her own child to go into the tiny facility, which became licensed to legally operate as a day-care in May — four months before a 1-year-old boy died and at least three other children were sickened there Friday.
“Two months ago, she started getting some children. She got one baby two months ago, and then two more started weeks ago,” the woman said.
“But she didn’t even take her own baby there. Not once.”
Ventura as well as Caristo Acevedo Brito, 41, who lived in the basement alongside the day-care business, were both slapped with murder, assault and child endangerment charges over the weekend after the death of the little boy, Nicholas Feliz Dominici.
Cops have since launched a manhunt for Ventura’s husband, who lived with her next-door and is believed to have been “the main player” in the illicit drug business, law-enforcement sources said.
The day-care center had just passed a surprise inspection — apparently with flying colors — by the state’s Office of Children and Family Services on Sept. 6, records show.
No violations were issued during the site visit, according to the records.
Divino Nino Daycare, although it was located in the Big Apple, is regulated by the state-run OCFS because it was licensed to operate with less than 12 children and was located inside a residence.
The city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene is in charge of day-cares across the five boroughs that cater for more than 12 kids in a personal home or three or more children in a non-residence.
Divino Nino Daycare was registered to cater to eight children, between 6 weeks to 12 years old, the records show.
The OCFS did not respond to a Post request for information about the recent inspection. Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office did not respond to a request for comment, either.
Authorities and law-enforcement sources have said a kilo of fentanyl and several kilo presses — devices typically used to combine the drug with either cocaine or heroin — were found inside the space used by the day care.
The kiddies were apparently exposed when the drug was cut in the day-care center and some of it floated into the air, allowing them to inhale it, sources said.
Cops had responded to a 911 call from the child care center shortly after 3:30 p.m. Friday and found three of the children unresponsive.
Dominici was rushed to Montefiore Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.
The two other children and a third also taken to the hospital by his mother remain hospitalized after being exposed to the deadly drug, police said. The three kids are two 2-year-old boys and the 8-month-old sister of one of them.
At least some of the kids were administered Narcan at the scene.