Daniel’s Law: Babies have been left abandoned, but there are life-saving options
He was following department procedures when he cut the umbilical cord of an infant found in a bag in the dumpster by two young brothers.
It was April 2015 and Capt. Keith Drabick was the first emergency responder at the Socastee apartment complex — a chaotic scene with civilians standing around, he described during a trial.
There was food and trash on the baby’s face. Drabick moved the trash away, clearing the airway so the baby, who was alive, could breathe.
Drabick asked a neighbor to grab a clean towel from home. He wrapped the infant, continuing to provide care and monitor the baby.
An ambulance arrived and Drabick was strapped onto the stretcher as he held the baby in his arms and they went to Waccamaw Hospital. Now the mother of the infant, Shelby Harper Taylor, is spending 25 years in prison. A jury found Taylor guilty of attempted murder in February.
There was life for the baby found in a dumpster by two teens who were taking out the trash and rescued by Drabick in 2015.
And through Daniel’s Law, there’s life for the unwanted babies who are left at safe havens. The law was created in 2000 to allow new parents to drop off babies without prosecution.
On Monday, Conway police said parents were wanted for abandoning their children at Health Care Partners, 1608 Main St., on June 5. The two suspects were arrested Wednesday and charged with unlawful neglect of a child by a legal custodian.
Last month, an 11-month-old girl was found dead inside a diaper box in Chesterfield County, according to Chesterfield County Sheriff Jay Brooks. The child’s mother, 19-year-old Breanna Lewis, initially reported the baby had been kidnapped, and an Amber Alert rang out through the Palmetto state.
Lewis is charged with homicide by child abuse. She was charged with filing a false police report just hours after the baby, Harlee Lane Lewis, was discovered by sheriff’s deputies who saw the diaper box, and when flipped over saw a plastic bag with the baby’s body inside, according to WBTW. She's also charged with improper disposal of human remains.
Safe havens in South Carolina are hospitals, law enforcement agencies, fire stations, emergency medical stations or a house of worship during staffed hours.
The 2015 event wasn’t the first time a child was found abandoned or dead in Horry County.
In 2008, a baby, known as Baby Boy Horry, was found dead in a shopping bag by utility workers near Conway. He was less than one day old.
The baby is buried at Hillcrest Cemetery in Conway. The community has remembered the infant’s short life through a ceremony Horry County coroner Robert Edge holds each year. Who the baby belonged to is a mystery, leaving it a cold case.
In 2016, a mother was charged with leaving her six-week-old son in a pond at Tanger Outlets near U.S. 501. The child drowned, according to the Horry County Coroner’s Office. The mother, Jameisha Katara Alexander, was denied bond and is awaiting trial.
About the law
Daniel’s Law says babies up to 60 days old may be taken to safe havens, and the person leaving the baby cannot be prosecuted and doesn’t have to reveal his or her identity. Immunity from prosecution may not apply if the baby has been harmed.
Chrysti Shain, public information officer for S.C. Department of Social Services, said the law gives the state’s most vulnerable children a chance to live.
“They get the opportunity to grow up, have birthdays and eventually have families of their own,” Shain said. “It’s so important to have places of safe haven for parents who can’t care for their baby, no matter what the reason.”
Horry County’s last reported baby who was left at a safe haven was in 2015 at Waccamaw Community Hospital, according to DSS records. Another baby was left the year before at Grand Strand Regional.
During fiscal year 2016-17, six infants were left at 6 hospitals in South Carolina, DSS records show.
DSS has legal custody of babies left at safe havens and works to place each child in a foster home.
The S.C. House of Representatives passed a bill in 2017 to extend the amount of time a person has to leave a baby at a safe haven, which came a couple months after a woman was sentenced to nearly three decades in prison in connection to the death of her 5-month-old daughter, Grace.
The bill is in senate committee.
Hannah Strong: 843-444-1765, @HannahLStrong
This story was originally published June 29, 2018 at 9:21 AM with the headline "Daniel’s Law: Babies have been left abandoned, but there are life-saving options."