This article is more than 10 months old

This article is more than 10 months old

A toddler has died after falling from a “faulty window” in a block of flats in north London.

Police were called to Stellar House in High Road, Tottenham, at about 11am on Thursday and found the boy, aged about 18 months, in a critical condition.

The London ambulance service, London fire brigade and air ambulance attended and the child was taken to a north London hospital but was pronounced dead shortly after arrival.

Residents in the tower block said the boy had fallen after opening the window in the ninth-floor flat.

A neighbour, Meral Dervik, said the toddler’s mother had been complaining to Haringey council about a faulty handle for two months but that nothing had been done. She said: “The window, it was faulty. Nearly two months, that was what [the mother] was saying. She was calling the council to come to fix it. The handle was not secure.”

She added: “I had the same problems with the windows, even the glass is broken.”

The toddler was said to have lived in the council flat close to the Tottenham Hotspur stadium with his mother, father and older sister.

Dervik said of the boy’s mother: “She was looking after the kids brilliantly, she cared about the children.”

Formal identification and a postmortem will take place in due course. The Metropolitan police are treating the death as unexplained and continuing their inquiries. A cordon remains in place at the scene and no arrests have been made.