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Friday, November 07, 2008
Law - Still more on "Neb. Officials: Parents Misusing Infant Drop-Off Law"
Updating earlier ILB entries (start here), Erika D. Smith of the Indianapolis Star has a story today headed "Indiana boy, 8, is latest to be left in Nebraska." Some quotes:
An 8-year-old Wabash County boy is in the custody of Nebraska child services workers today after his mother -- taking advantage of that state's lenient and controversial safe-haven law -- left him at an Omaha hospital Thursday. * * *So far, 28 children have been left under Nebraska's safe-haven law, which took effect in July. Just two sentences long, it states that anyone can leave a child at a hospital without fear of prosecution for abandonment.
The measure was intended to protect infants, [Jeanne Atkinson, spokeswoman for Nebraska's Division of Children and Family Services] said, but that was never written into the law. Instead, parents, such as the Indiana mother, have seized on the word "child" to legally drop off children as old as 17.
Legislators are holding a special session this month to add an age limit of 3 days old to the law.
Indiana's safe-haven law applies to children who are younger than 45 days old.
It allows parents to drop off an infant -- no questions asked -- at sites such as hospitals, police stations and firehouses. The child then is placed in the custody of the Department of Child Services' office in the county where he or she was dropped off.
Legislators enacted the law in 2000 in response to the death of a baby who was abandoned in a snowdrift outside Community Hospital North.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on November 7, 2008 09:16 AM
Posted to General Law Related