"I don't understand anyone doing this, when we have this law that allows anyone to go to a hospital or fire station within 72 hours of birth and anonymously leave the newborn without prosecution," she said. "But I guess we don't know what this girl was going through. We just don't know."
Los Angeles police said there typically are five to eight such cases in the city each year, although some of the abandoned infants are found in time to be rescued. This case is the fourth this year, said Det. Supervisor Peggy Leberknight of the Los Angeles Police Department's child abuse unit. In a 1997 case, USC student Linda Chu was sentenced to five years in prison after she was found guilty of strangling her newborn daughter and placing her in the trash chute at her dormitory.
"Women are scared," Leberknight said in explanation. "They don't want to let anyone know they're pregnant. And it's not just young women. It can be older women as well, who don't want to reveal their pregnancy for whatever reason, and maybe they don't know about the law."
Deanne Tilton Durfee, executive director of the Los Angeles County Inter-Agency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect, said there was no common profile for women who abandon their newborns.
"The one key component, though, is secrecy. The expectant mother has hidden the pregnancy," Durfee said. "In some cases they've denied its existence, haven't prepared for it or they haven't told anyone."
Since the state adopted the safe-surrender law in 2001, 35 infants have been left at fire stations and hospitals. Durfee said ignorance of the law probably leads some young mothers to abandon their infants in secret. She also said it was important for those who suspect a woman might be pregnant to say something about it.
Times staff writers Jonathan Abrams, Monte Morin and Wendy Thermos contributed to this report.
