By Cindy Wolff
The Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Copyright 2006 The Commercial Appeal, Inc.
A woman drove up to the fire station at 333 East Parkway N. early in the afternoon Tuesday carrying a brown paper sack. “Is this a safe place?” she asked.
“It is,” said firefighter Lt. Larry Boothby.
She handed him the sack, got back in her car and drove away without giving her name.
Inside the bag was a baby girl with a wisp of blond hair. The newborn was asleep and naked except for a blanket she was bundled in. A paperclip was attached to the freshly cut umbilical cord.
The fire station is a designated Safe Place for children who feel threatened or in danger. Under Tennessee’s safe baby law, safe haven providers include hospitals, community health centers and walk-in clinics .
Boothby said he was glad the young woman cared enough about her child to save it. He wished the mother of the newborn unearthed last week by a dog had done the same thing. That mother, Sierra Wiliams, 20, was charged with reckless homicide in her baby’s death.
“She didn’t throw her in the park or toss her in a Dumpster,” said Boothby of the mother who surrendered the baby on Tuesday. “Her baby is alive because she did the right thing.”
Paramedics took the baby to the Regional Medical Center at Memphis. She was all right. The Department of Children’s Services is investigating. They will try to find the father or another relative who might want the baby.
The department doesn’t keep track of how many children are surrendered through the safe place program, said DCS spokesman Rob Johnson.
The baby girl was the first for Boothby, who has only been at the firehouse for eight days after getting a promotion.
He smoked cigarettes while he waited for a Memphis Police crime scene investigator to come take the now-empty sack, which was sitting near a chair by the front desk.
“Oh my gosh,” police officer Hope Smith said when she arrived to photograph and take custody of the sack.
“This is so sad,” she said.
“At least she did the right thing,” Boothby said.
He wondered what was so wrong in this woman’s life that she would put a baby in a sack and take it to a fire station.
“Obviously whatever she has going on, she couldn’t handle it,” said Boothby.
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Safe haven
Tennessee’s infant safe haven law allows a mother to surrender her baby, 72 hours old or younger, to a designated safe place such as a hospital, community health center or walk-in clinic.