Abandoned Newborn Saved
Dangerous temperatures threatened child's life
Updated 4:35 PM CST, Wed, Dec 24, 2008
Perhaps it's a Christmas miracle.
She was wrapped only in a blanket and left in an unheated vesitbule of an apartment building, but the newborn is reported to be doing fairly well Tuesday morning at Children's Memorial Hospital, where she was taken after being abandoned on Monday.
Chicago authorities say the baby girl, just a few days old, was found in the North Side's Uptown neighborhood.
Chicago Fire Department spokesman Larry Langford said the infant, described by authorities as Hispanic, was left in an extremely cold vestibule, wrapped in a blanket and placed in a paper bag or some other sort of improvised container.
It was unclear how long the baby had been sitting in the vestibule.
"To even fathom the idea that you would leave your own child, your own seed, sitting out there in the cold is a tragedy," neighbor Greg Nelson was quoted by WBBM-TV as saying.
While Illinois has a "safe haven" law, which allows parents or guardians of a newborn to surrender the child, no questions asked, to someone working at a police station, a fire house or hospital, it may not apply in this case because of where the child was left.
Authorities are trying to locate the parent or person who has custody of the child.
Copyright Associated Press / NBC Chicago
First Published: Dec 23, 2008 8:16 AM CST
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