Los Angeles County Supervisor Don Knabe is pleased to announce that a baby boy was safely surrendered at a hospital in the City of Downey last week.
The newborn Hispanic male was surrendered at the emergency room of Downey Regional Medical Center on Saturday, October 27 and is reported to be in good health. As is standard practice, the baby boy is in protective custody and will eventually be placed with a family approved for adoption by the Department of Children and Family Services.
I want to thank this newborn’s mother for doing the right thing, said Knabe. We have a law on the books to protect babies from abandonment and give the mother a safe, secure and anonymous way to get her child into safe hands.
This is the fifteenth Safe Surrender in Los Angeles County in 2007 and the sixty second Safe Surrender since the program began six years ago. The program was initiated by Supervisor Knabe and approved unanimously by the Board of Supervisors in 2001. It allows someone to surrender an infant that is no more than three days old, as long as the infant shows no signs of abuse.