Posted on 11/01/2003 12:26:50 PM PST by twas
She waited a long time, but Baby Jane Doe is finally going home.
Seven and a half months after Buffalo State College student Colleen Smith threw the body of her newborn - later called "Jane Doe" in court proceedings - into a dumpster outside her dorm, the Smith family stepped forward Friday afternoon to claim the baby girl's body from the Erie County morgue.
At 1:30 p.m., Baby Jane Doe's remains were taken from a refrigerated drawer in the morgue and given to a Rochester funeral home, which is handling burial arrangements for the Smith family.
An outpouring of public concern in Western New York followed the news - revealed in The Buffalo News earlier this week - that the baby's body remained unclaimed. Dozens of people offered money, burial plots or other assistance to ensure that the baby would receive a proper burial.
"We've had baby deaths, many of them, before," said District Attorney Frank J. Clark, who was approached by many people inquiring about the situation and offering help. "But nothing that has ever affected people like this."
Barry N. Covert, Smith's attorney, said that the family had expressed interest in claiming the baby months ago and that the action Friday did not result from the public's attention to the case.
The "unusual situation" surrounding the baby's death had lengthened the process of planning the funeral and burial, Covert said. He didn't specify when services will be held or where the baby will be buried.
The family didn't know how to go about it, Covert said, adding that a private service had been planned through the Smiths' Lutheran minister in Webster.
Colleen Smith, 22, has pleaded guilty to attempted manslaughter and is scheduled to be sentenced in January.
Michelle Oberman, a neonaticide expert who teaches law at Chicago's DePaul University, said that while families involved in neonaticide cases may be grieving, traditional death rites can be tricky to orchestrate.
"The child was never integrated into the mother or the family's life in the first place, so the reasons for mourning are usually not as present," Oberman said. "There has been a loss, but there's not always a way to translate that loss into a full-blown funeral."
Ultimately, though, families often find that holding funerals for these babies can be a way to work through the guilt they feel about the situation.
"They're often angry and going through a lot of self-doubt because they weren't close enough to their daughter for her to confide in them about her pregnancy," Oberman said.
But in at least one case Oberman has studied - that of a 17-year-old Illinois girl - the baby's funeral became a vehicle for the grandparents to punish their daughter.
"They made her go out and buy a christening gown, and they buried the baby in this very beautiful gown," Oberman said. "They were furious, and they were punishing her for taking away their grandchild."
Although Smith's baby's final resting place remains unknown, community members who offered to fund her burial expressed relief Friday.
"How sad that it took public humiliation for the family to do the right thing," said Joan Rummell, an Amherst resident who had offered to raise money for funeral and burial expenses. "I hope that poor baby knows that she is cared about and loved even by strangers."
Unspeakable profanity that would surely get me banned for life!
Who raised this pig? They should be ashamed.
Hellfire! I am ashamed to be in the same species as her.
Like to see those liberal Democratic supporters of 'Pro-Choice -- Right To Murder Babies' squirm to explain the difference between Abortion Mills discarding their late-term newborn victims into the OR trash-can, and this.
Am I the only having a hard time trying to figure out what you are saying...So what was "it" - a zombie?
IN any case Peter the great did not say that.
I went to school with Colleen Smith and worked with her for several years till about a year before this incident occurred.
Even 17 years later I canâÂÂt believe the same sweet girl I knew committed this horrible act.
She was a great woman and had a light about her that warmed everyone around her. I donâÂÂt know the circumstances that lead to her to go down this path but I hope she and her family can find peace someday.
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