Would it be immoral to keep the baby and not call authories?

[jamie]

Police are looking for a mother who abandoned her newborn on a family's front porch in near-freezing temperatures early Saturday morning.

The blond-haired girl, who was wrapped in a blue towel and a purple hand-crocheted blanket, still had her umbilical cord attached and was 6 to 8 hours old, said Detective Paul Lazar of the Brownstown Police Department.

The baby is in guarded condition at Children's Hospital, where doctors are watching for signs of infection, he said.

Rafal Rozner and his wife, Karolina, discovered the baby as they were pulling out of their driveway at the end of a quiet cul-de-sac in Brownstown Township's Fox Creek subdivision, shortly after 8 a.m. Saturday.

"Everything was a miracle," said Rafal Rozner, who left his home through a side door to an attached garage but heard a baby crying and noticed the tiny bundle on his porch.

Rafal Rozner, a 28-year-old truck driver, said he and his wife usually stay home Saturday morning but left early because they had a 9 a.m. appointment at a veterinarian to get shots for their dogs.

"I walked to the blanket, and I saw a baby's little hands, asking for help," he said. "She was very weak and cold."

link (http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060409/METRO/604090358/1003)

Michigan DOES have safe drop off laws allowing mothers to drop off their babies at hosipitals, fire stations and police stations, no questions asked. Would you be tempted to just keep the infant and not call authorities? WOuld it be immoral?

[Jory]

I would probably be tempted. I suppose it could be imoral because the baby might have extended family who would want to take it in. Or because there are people who have been wanting to adopt for a while. Regardless, I don't see how you could keep it. You would have to go to the hospital to have it checked out. I guess you could make up a lie that it was your sister's baby and that she abandoned it or something. I don't know.

[mom2burgess]

Like Jory, I would most definatly be tempted to keep it. But It just wouldn't be the right thing to do. Besides the fact that it would have to be checked by a doctor, later on, there will be a TON of problems due to lack of documentation (like birth certificates, no social security number, etc) Plus, there may be other family that would take it in

[Archangel]

It would be very risky under these circumstances. Because the baby was left out so long, had it died in their care because they didn't take it to the hospital they would have been legally responsible for its death because they didn't get it help when they found it so cold.

Had the person rang the bell and banged on the door before running away, and made sure they found the baby right away then maybe things would have been different. But this was a newborn child and needed to be checked out properly so I don't see how keeping it would have been an option really.

[abcNKH]

No, I would not be tempted to keep it. You don't know how that child got there, for all you know, someone stole it and there is are frantic parents somewhere looking for it.

[Terrell]

Taking the baby would be wrong, as it may have other family that miss it. I would hope to never encounter the situation, but I'd immediately call the police if I found a baby on my doorstep. I would not be tempted to keep the baby.

[jamie]

I gotta tell you, I'd be tempted to keep it. I know I COULDN'T keep it, but I'd want to. I wonder if states give people who discover babies like this any adoption preference? Would you approve of something like that? If the person passed the required checks to adopt?

[eva]

Same here - I would be very tempted ot keep it, but of course wouldn't. I love babies.

[Clio]

I wouldn't keep it for the same reason as NKH mentioned, you just don't know what the crcumstances were.

This made my skin crawl though: Michigan DOES have safe drop off laws allowing mothers to drop off their babies at hosipitals, fire stations and police stations, no questions asked.


You can dump off your baby and not have to explain why????? Absolutely ridiculous!

[Demona]

You can dump off your baby and not have to explain why????? Absolutely ridiculous!

It's in order to stop desperate mothers simply killing or neglecting their child in order to avoid caring for it. If it saves children, I don't really have a problem with it, and if anonymity of the birth mother is the price paid for that, I think it's fair enough. I don't know to what extent it is open to abuse, though.

[eva]

You can dump off your baby and not have to explain why????? Absolutely ridiculous!

This has really reduced the incidents of babies left in dumpsters, toilets, etc. Most states have these laws, but many do not provide anonymity to the mother.

[abcNKH]

This made my skin crawl though:

You can dump off your baby and not have to explain why????? Absolutely ridiculous!AZ also has a safe drop off law. Hospitals, fire stations, churches, a few other places I can't think of. Unlike giving it up for adoption, the mother loses all parental rights immediately. She is not subject to criminal charges of any sort, and the baby must be dropped off within 5 days of birth or something like that. The idea of the law is to keep young mothers from dropping their babies in a dumpster.

[Shannie-Poo]

You can dump off your baby and not have to explain why????? Absolutely ridiculous!

Too many babies were being left in trashcans, sides of the roads, abandoned buildings and dying. So they came up with this law, if the mother knows that she wont get charged if she just drops them off, then more babies will be saved, which is the real reason this law is in place.

[Clio]

Abortion is illegal here yet the instances of babies being dumped is practically zero. In the US abortion is freely available yet babies are being left in rubbish bins? Try go figure that one out!

[kmhowe72]

There is away mothers can abandone there childen legally here in the U.S. they just bring them to a fire station or an emergency room. I think it's only up to a certain months.