The Third Incident Of Such Since Last Year
PHOTO: Residents who rushed to the scene
By King Brown,sarwahking@gmail.com
BUCHANAN, Liberia– A newborn baby boy has been discovered dead and wrapped up in a black plastic bag in this southern port city in Grand Bassa County, leaving residents shocked.
The body of the infant was discovered along the Kpandy Town Community road in this city on Thursday, August 10, 2023 at around 1:30 Pm GMT.
Though the cause of the infant’s death remains unknown, police in Buchanan are investigating whether the put in the bag while alive or its remains were placed in the bag by the roadside by an unknown person.
The baby boy discovered after the plastic bag was opened.
Police say if the suspect is arrested, he/she may be charged with murder, reckless abandonment and cruelty to children, among other crimes and sent to court.
Three children who were walking along the road kicked the plastic bag and spotted the feet of the infant, according to 38-year-old Josephine Tarr, a resident of the community.
During a police preliminary investigation, Madam Tarr said that the unidentified children told her they saw something like a baby’s body in a plastic bag not too far from her house. But when she and her 17 years old brother Amos Whea got to the scene, they saw a dead child instead.
She added: “Three smaller children came to me, they say they see something in a plastic bag looking like a dead baby dog, they say they identified the body from the feet, so I call my little brother and we went there but when we bent over the plastic, it was not a dog but a dead baby body, so I quickly informed the community leader Jerry Kpah about it.”
Madam JosephineTarr told Police officer Isaac Dwen that she doesn’t know the three children who informed her about the situation, because they were passersby and neither does she know the mother of the dead infant. Also, her brother, Amos Whea who previously accompanied her on the scene was not present when the police got there at 2:00 P,m though she gave his contact to him.
After her testimony, a 15-member coroner jury performed an inquest on the body. The team, headed by the community zone leader Jerry Kpah, later reported that there was no foul play.
So far, no one has been arrested but the body of the baby boy was laid to rest the same day by the community dwellers.
Residents of Buchan who rushed to the scene, most of them females, described the act as disappointing and said the situation also created fear and brought shame to residents of the area.
They suspected that a teenager may have given birth on Wednesday night and due to the lack of financial support to cater to the newborn child, the individual decided to abandon him.
Residents here are urging the public to come forward with any information that could lead to identifying the dead infant’s mother.
The latest discovery of the dead baby in the black plastic bag has brought to three the number of newborn babies found dead in shopping plastic bags along major the roadside in in Grand Bassa County since 2022.