UK - Three abandoned babies (2017, 2019, 2024) full siblings found in London

[Smccat]

I was disappointed to note that Elsa was found at 9:15pm at night on the coldest night of the year. And thought to have been there an hour or so. It’s a miracle she was found. But there lies in the beauty of London. Busy and vibrant. If it was that time where I live it would be very different.

 

[MissMalowe]

All I can think of is Josef Fritzl, who held his daughter prisoner for decades and raped her daily. She was able to raise three of her kids in the basement dungeon and some of them were raised by him and his wife. I wonder if they can easily tell if the babies are a product of incest.

By no means an expert.....just found this info after a quick google search about DNA because I was curious about that too. (parents possibly being related to one another)

The Tech Article

 

[Lucy6226]

All I can think of is Josef Fritzl, who held his daughter prisoner for decades and raped her daily. She was able to raise three of her kids in the basement dungeon and some of them were raised by him and his wife. I wonder if they can easily tell if the babies are a product of incest.

This has crossed my mind too. Not sure if police would release that information, but they must know through the DNA testing

 

[Smccat]

It’s so bizzare isn’t it. With baby 1 Harry - you could think they were young and terrified of something but how the others. You’d think 2- Roman - would be rectifying the mistake and trying in some way to be better.

How do we get 2024? Poor Elsa.

 

[OceanElix]

Do they have baby hatches in the UK? Or can you leave a newborn anonymously somewhere else, e.g. at a hospital? If so, I wonder why the mother isn't doing so. I'd prefer to hear what's really behind this before I condemn the mother however.

Good wishes for the three abandoned babies.

MOO

BBM That is not available in the UK

 

[LadyL]

so all three babies are alive and well?

 

[Goecke]

I thought of that, too. Maybe someone with DNA expertise can tell us.

I work in cytogenetics and we look for regions of homozygosity (portions of the genome that are identical, suggesting shared ancestry) while doing microarray testing since people with multiple ROHs are at higher risk of autosomal recessive diseases. However, many people from small/insular ethnic groups tend to have multiple ROHs, and this isn't indicative of incest- There's naturally bound to be some degree of shared ancestry in insular groups due to there just not being many people. This is also why certain genetic diseases occur at an abnormally high rate among certain ethnic groups. I'm not sure if testing for ROH is done in forensic applications, I'm just speaking from my experience.

TL;DR: There is a way to test for shared ancestry, but shared ancestry isn't always indicative of incest and you really can't tell if the parents are related just by testing their child.

 

[seasideForest]

so all three babies are alive and well?

Yes. Two of them are no longer babies though and have been adopted, presumably a few years ago. There's information on that in the reports.

 

[shinimeggie]

I don't think the UK (or at least England) has anywhere you can safely leave an infant without you being sought out and it potentially being a crime. Perhaps a hospital birth where you decided afterwards, at the literal last minute, that you couldn't cope and the baby gets taken into the system, but not if you give birth outside of a hospital and then don't want, or can't have, the baby.

It's good to know that we've had many years with zero baby abandonments, but we've had plenty of crimes that include abuse or death of babies and toddlers that have seemed unwanted, and maybe these crimes would happen less if we did have a Safe Haven law that allowed a baby up to a certain number of months to be given to a hospital, fire station, police station, or even a baby hatch.

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong and that you can hand in a baby (not a newborn at a hospital for adoption) somewhere without the police getting involved and trying to track you down, but it's not something I've ever heard of.

ETA: I have seen news reports of mothers being found after their living babies were discovered abandoned and the police have decided to take no further action, but that's at police discretion and only happens if the baby lives, which can just be luck depending on how/when the baby was abandoned.

 

[Bagpus]

This is really disturbing and unfortunately probably paints a pretty dark picture of Mum’s home life. IMOO.

Yes. I'm wondering if it's a case of an "employer", or pimp raping the same woman multiple times as opposed to a set of parents as we might imagine that to be.

 

[LadyL]

I guess since they have DNA, they have run it through any criminal databases?

 

[Pseudonymph]

It surprises me there aren't any safe haven dropoffs in the UK. The NHS is usually pretty progressive about these things..And especially after the terrible legacy of orphanages in Ireland.

 

[BreadnLumpit]

It surprises me there aren't any safe haven dropoffs in the UK. The NHS is usually pretty progressive about these things..And especially after the terrible legacy of orphanages in Ireland.

I think it might be because abandonment of newborns is so rare here. We have easy and free access to contraception and abortion and anyone wanting to give a baby up for adoption immediately after their (free) hospital birth, can do so without judgement.

Firefighters here are not paramedics, as I believe they are in the US? So any drop off hatches would need to be at hospitals, which are by nature bustling with people and bristling with CCTV.

Abandonment does still happen of course, but in those rare instances it's usually very young girls, who have been too scared to tell their parents. This case feels different because of the repeat nature of it - I suspect an abusive/ illicit relationship along the lines of incest/small religious cult/ missing woman held prisoner scenarios. JMO.

I can't help but wonder about the 5 year gap between the two sisters - it seems a stretch to think that there were no pregnancies in that time

 

[pol100gk]

There's been a near identical case in Berlin/Germany. Three babies left to be found and by the same parents. One a year for three years.
Apologies but only reported on in German: Jedes Jahr einen Säugling ausgesetzt: Das Rätsel der drei Geschwisterkinder
I couldn't find any update on this so they have not found the parents. But basically same story. And they do have baby hatches in Berlin but they were not used. Police called the case 'unprecedented'.

 

[Shamrock1]

I wouldn’t necessarily assume the mother is mentally ill, though it’s highly likely she needs major assistance. Elisabeth Fritzl had three of her newborns taken and “abandoned” at her parents’ home.

Fritzl case - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[seasideForest]

It surprises me there aren't any safe haven dropoffs in the UK. The NHS is usually pretty progressive about these things..

It's a crime to abandon a baby in the UK. It's a crime in the rest of Europe according to this BBC article from 2013 www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-22123366
but certainly in some countries where baby hatches have been installed, like in Germany, the law has been amended to make it legal to leave a baby in one of these hatches.

And especially after the terrible legacy of orphanages in Ireland.

I don't think that would affect the law in the UK though.
MOO

 

[Dotta]

We have "Windows of life" in Poland.

They are in hospitals, Church buildings, doctors' practices in every town/city.

Window of Life -
(Okno Życia in Polish)

a specially prepared place that allows mothers who cannot or do not want to take care of their newborn to leave the baby/babies there anonymously and safely.

"What is a 'window of life'?​

'A Window of Life'
is a place where a woman can anonymously leave her child after giving birth.

The main goal of creating such places
is to provide a safe space,
thanks to which the child has a chance for a loving home,
which for various reasons cannot be provided by child's biological mother.

It is also a safe space for the mother:
the woman leaves the baby anonymously,
which is not allowed by the procedure for leaving the baby in the hospital after birth."

Okno życia – Wikipedia, wolna encyklopedia

pl.m.wikipedia.org

Okna życia od lat budzą kontrowersje. Mało kto wie, co dokładnie dzieje się z dziećmi

Od kilku lat coraz częściej w oknach życia rozlega się alarm. Powstają też kolejne punkty, w których rodzice mogą anonimowo oddać dzieci. Pierwsze okna życia powstały już kilkaset lat temu. O ile w średniowieczu ich funkcjonowanie było w pełni uzasadnione, o tyle dziś okna życia często wzbudzają...

mamadu.pl

 

[Macha]

There was a case in Ireland where three babies were abandoned. Only in the recent past it was discovered they were full siblings. It went back as far as the 1960's. Turns out the father was a married man and the mother couldn't live with the guilt and shame.

 

[OddOneOut]

Firefighters here are not paramedics, as I believe they are in the US? So any drop off hatches would need to be at hospitals, which are by nature bustling with people and bristling with CCTV.

Firefighters are not paramedics in the US. However, they are usually members of the fire department itself and based out of our fire stations. When they go out, they are usually accompanied by a fire truck; although, the reason for that escapes me at the moment.

 

[seasideForest]

I think it might be because abandonment of newborns is so rare here.

RSBM for focus.
How rare though? I saw 16 per year for England and Wales in some publication and 60 in another one. Both are I suppose 'relatively' rare. otoh even 16 abandoned babies are too many individually.
The Office of National Statistics gives you an email to try some other gov't dept www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/abandonedinfantsintheuk2022 and I'm not interested enough to chase it up and/or expect they might not respond since I don't live in England & Wales or any other part of the UK.

I imagine it has more to do the kind of arguments brought forth by the UN and other experts in this article www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jun/10/unitednations-europe-news
MOO