UNNAMED GIRL - 10 months (7/14) - / Suspect: Mother, Frankea Dabbs - Manhattan, NY

NYPD: Mom of baby abandoned in subway in custody
| July 8, 2014 | Updated: July 8, 2014 9:58am


Photo By Uncredited/AP 
In this Monday, July 7, 2014 surveillance camera image provided by the New York Police Department, a woman, top right, pushes her baby girl in a stroller at the Columbus Circle subway station in New York. The 20-year-old woman, who is suspected of abandoning the baby at the Manhattan station, was in police

NEW YORK (AP) — A woman suspected of abandoning her baby girl at a Manhattan subway station was in police custody on Tuesday.

The 20-year-old woman was being questioned after being found around 12:30 a.m. Tuesday near Central Park, around 72nd Street and Broadway, police said.

No charges were immediately filed. The investigation was continuing.

Authorities were notified of the woman's whereabouts by someone who recognized her from photos and video police released showing a woman pushing the child through a subway turnstile.

The woman pushed the baby's stroller onto the platform from a northbound No. 1 train when it arrived at the Columbus Circle station and then got back onto the train, police said.

A passenger observed the woman and child board the train at 42nd Street and Seventh Avenue, police said. The passenger got off at Columbus Circle and noticed the unattended stroller on the platform and the mother inside the train. After the train pulled away, the passenger remained with the baby for about 20 minutes. When the mother did not return, she notified a subway worker who called police.

Authorities described the baby as 6 to 7 months old. She was examined at Roosevelt Hospital, and no apparent signs of trauma were found.

The baby was placed in the care of the city's Administration for Children's Services.

A city law that allows people to take an unwanted baby to a firehouse, police station or hospital with no questions asked would not have applied in this case because it only pertains to infants 5 days old or younger.


http://www.chron.com/news/us/article/NYPD-Mom-of-baby-abandoned-in-subway-in-custody-5605882.php

Mother accused of leaving baby in subway told police she is homeless

AT 10:08 AM JULY 08, 2014
By MAYA SRIKRISHNAN

The mother accused of leaving her 10-month-old baby girl on a New York City subway platform said she is homeless and police suspect she abandoned the child because she could not adequately care for her, law enforcement officials said Tuesday.

Frankea Dabbs, 20, was charged Monday with child abandonment and acting in a manner injurious to a child, police said.

Dabbs was taken into custody shortly after midnight near 72nd Street and Broadway after police were told of her whereabouts by a tipster who had seen the widely circulated photos and video, police said. A woman was seen pushing the baby’s stroller onto a subway platform Monday at the Columbus Circle station and proceeding to get back onto a northbound train.

The mother told police that she is from North Carolina and came to New York on July 2. She said the baby's father died recently in California.

The child was examined at a hospital and is in good condition. She is in the custody of the New York City Administration for Children’s Services, police say.

Although New York City has a law that allows people to take an unwanted baby to a firehouse, police station or hospital with no questions asked, it would not have applied in this case because it only pertains to infants 5 days old or younger.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-mother-left-baby-subway-platform-20140708-story.html

Mom Who Left Baby On Subway Saw Boyfriend Killed, Dad Says

Jul 8, 2014, 11:13 AM ET
By RHEANA MURRAY and AARON KATERSKY

The woman accused of abandoning her baby on crowded New York City subway platform has been erratic since seeing her boyfriend shot to death while she hid nearby, the woman's father told ABC News today.

Frankea Dabbs, 20, left her 10-month-old daughter on a busy Manhattan subway station and got back on the train and left on Monday. She was arrested and charged today with abandoning a child and committing actions injurious to a child less than the age of 17. She told police she was homeless after arriving in the city on June 2 and couldn't handle being a mother.

"She felt she couldn't take care of the baby and thought she was leaving her in a safe public space," said Stephen Davis, spokesman for the New York Police Department.

Her father told ABC News today that he had no idea that his daughter and granddaughter were in New York, but said she has been unnerved since the shooting.

"She saw her boyfriend get killed," Franklin Dabbs of Wilmington, North Carolina, told ABC News. "Three guys came to the house. She was hiding under the bed. She was two months pregnant then. I think that burden was still with her."

The father knew the boyfriend only as Demetrius, he said.

Dabbs said that ever since the shooting his daughter wore sunglasses everywhere and wanted to be in dark rooms all the time, a possible indication of the emotional state of a woman.

Dabbs said his daughter was once a great mom.

"I'm very surprised -- she was always a good mother to her baby," he said.

"I've seen her clean the baby, feed the baby, everything. I'm speechless, really," he said.

Her father says he learned about the arrest on the news and is planning a trip to New York.

"I know she's a good mother," he said. "I don't understand what happened. I love both of them. All I want is my kids back in North Carolina with me, especially my grandchild."

Dabbs' last known address was in Raleigh, North Carolina, but she had identification indicating that she was from California. She told police that the baby's father had recently died in California, contradicting her father's account that he died in North Carolina.

She has an active warrant out of North Carolina for marijuana possession, according to police records.

"I'm just glad they found the mom and the baby's fine," said Catherine Boursier, the woman who found the stranded child on the subway platform alone in a red-and-white polka-dot stroller on Monday.

Boursier stayed with the child until police arrived around noon.

Frankea Dabbs admitted to police that she abandoned her baby, authorities said.

She was arrested early this morning on Manhattan's Upper West Side after the NYPD released a photo of the infant, shown sucking on a bottle and wearing a red-and-white blouse.

She was taken into custody about 12:30 a.m. not far from where she is accused of leaving the infant.

The baby was taken to St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center for a check-up and is in stable condition. The baby is now in custody of the city's Administration for Children's Services.

Police also released a video showing a woman, wearing sunglasses and a white tank top pushing the infant through the emergency exit to enter a subway station. She later leaves the station the same way after returning on a subway train without the baby.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/mom-accused-leaving-baby-subway-platform/story?id=24465578