Police are searching for the parents of three newborn babies found wrapped in shopping bags and abandoned in parks in East London over the past seven years.
A police report obtained by People revealed that baby Elsa, found just an hour after she was born in a shopping bag in Newham amid sub-zero temperatures in January this year, is a sibling of two other newborns.
DNA tests confirmed that Baby Elsa is a full sibling of Baby Harry, abandoned in a children’s play park in Plaistow in 2017, and Baby Roman, found in a park area in Newham in 2019.
All three newborns were found alive and were immediately placed in special care, with the oldest two since being adopted, PA Media reports. Baby Elsa is still in foster care.
The Metropolitan Police have not yet been able to identify the mother or parents despite numerous media appeals over the newborns.
“We’ve issued a timely media appeal and conducted a wealth of checks, reviewing many hours of CCTV and speaking to media from the scene where Elsa was found to raise awareness,” Met Police confirmed.
Authorities are also seeking to identify a woman dressed in an oversized dark coat who was seen carrying a rucksack shortly before Elsa was found. Temperatures were 26.6 degrees in Newham on the night she was discovered, Reuters previously reported.
“We understand the significant public interest that will come following the lifting of restrictions that allow this information to be reported,” Detective Inspector Jamie Humm from North East Command Unit stated on Tuesday (June 4th).
“It is significant news, and our work has focused on trying to locate the mother and provide support to her.”
“We have worked 24/7 in each of these three cases to identify the parents so far without success,” the Detective Inspector added.
“We have also had to be mindful of the sensitivities that exist now, and all of the children are being cared for. Their welfare, including their privacy, is paramount.”
“We continue to investigate and will consider the next steps in our investigation,” he concluded.
In her ruling to lift reporting restrictions on Monday, Carol Atkinson, the most senior judge in East London, emphasized the rarity and public interest surrounding the abandonment cases. She highlighted the importance of transparency and public awareness in such matters.
“The abandonment of a baby in this country is a very, very unusual event, and there are years where there are no children abandoned, and because of that, it is the story of the abandoning of a child that is of public interest,” she said in a statement.
“If I restrict these rights and the reporting of that story, I think that does impact on public consciousness of these sorts of matters. It restricts the openness of justice.”
The ruling follows several initiatives aimed at enhancing transparency within the family court system.
