"Newborn Jane Doe" - Found deceased in box - Houston TX

by TomTerrific0420 Wed Dec 29, 2010 4:11 am

A baby girl's body was found Tuesday after someone discarded her in a box near a trash bin at a gated southeast Houston apartment complex, police said.

A maintenance worker
at the Windshire Apartment Homes at 4415 Shaver Road found the box near
an overflowing trash bin by the front of the complex about 10:45 a.m.,
said Sgt. Will Gonzales, of the Houston Police Department Homicide
Division.

The worker did not inspect the contents, but placed the box on his golf cart to move it to another bin, Gonzales said.

When the cart turned a corner, the box fell off and the infant's body tumbled out.

The baby's umbilical cord was still attached, Gonzales said. He believes the child was born Monday night or early Tuesday.

Gonzales said he
couldn't tell if the girl was a full-term baby. Police didn't observe
any immediately visible signs of trauma to her body, Gonzales said. She
appeared to be Hispanic, he said.

Investigators at the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences will conduct an autopsy today.

The apartment
complex has no security cameras, police said. Residents and visitors
need an entry code to open the apartments' gates to drive into the
complex.

Alba Rodriguez, 29,
who lives in the apartment building directly next to the trash bin where
the worker intended to move the box, said she saw the baby's body as
investigators examined the remains after she returned home around 2 p.m.

Rodriguez said the baby appeared to have been wrapped in a plastic bag, then covered with a towel or jacket.

"It was probably a day old, if that," she said. The baby "had a lot of hair," she added.

The infant was in a fetal position with her eyes closed and appeared to weigh no more than 7 pounds, she said.

"I started crying,"
said Rodriguez, who is the mother of a young child. "I was like, 'Oh my
God, I don't know how somebody could do something like that.'

"There was blood everywhere, but I'm pretty sure it was from the actual delivery," she added.

Managers in the complex had no comment.