Haven law targets baby abandonment

West Jordan Police Capt. Gary Cox has investigated cases where newborn babies were hidden or dumped after their birth mothers went to great length to hide pregnancies.

And he's held at least one baby whose teenage mother made sure the baby lived, though she didn't want to raise it. He and his wife adopted that baby.

"I'll be forever thankful" to that young mother, he said, during a news conference Thursday to announce additional resources to teach those who might be considering harming or abandoning babies about the state's safe-haven law.

The 2001 law says a newborn, up to three days old, may be taken to a hospital and handed over to staff, no questions asked, no investigation to follow. Utah was one of the first states to pass such a law; 46 others now have it on the books, said Sen. Patrice Arent, D-South Cottonwood.

No single case prompted the law, according to Arent, who was the House sponsor at the time it passed. The issue was burbling. A newborn had been hidden in a dresser drawer not long before. Just months before the law was introduced, a baby had been abandoned at a miniature golf course, a woman had a baby at the airport amid questions about her intentions and officials were hearing of babies left in garbage containers in other states.

Arent said as lawmakers were considering the issue, she was getting middle-of-the-night phone calls from women who said they wished they'd had a safe haven years ago when they were pregnant and scared and making decisions. "Those calls are still so vivid to me," she said.

The news-conference loca- tion, Pioneer Valley Hospital in West Valley City, was fitting, organizers from the Utah Newborn Safe Haven Committee said, because an infant was saved when its mother dropped it off there. And another infant died there after it was found too late.

Arent said many young pregnant women don't know about the law or how to use it. "Girls are not sitting home reading Utah Code."

Besides the law itself, there's a Web site that offers information and resources (www.utahsafehaven.org) and a toll-free phone line that's answered around the clock. That number is 1-866-694-2229 (694-Baby). Resources include not only information on the safe-haven law, but also on adoption, child care, health care and more.

Young women and girls who want to use safe haven were cautioned, though, that they need to hand the baby over to a hospital staffer. "Don't just leave it on the sidewalk or in the lobby," said Joe Krella of the Utah Hospitals and Health Systems Association.