The newborn baby was reportedly thrown down the trash chute in a plastic trash bag. It was believed to have fallen eight stories, straight into a compactor, in a high-rise building in Brooklyn’s Walt Whitman Housing Project.
Authorities said the boy miraculously survived thanks to the trash cushioning his fall.
“I’m sorry for the baby,” neighbor Aida Morales said.
Police surrounded the public housing high-rise at 102 Cumberland Way immediately after the discovery was made shortly after 9 a.m. Sunday.
Authorities took photographs outside while investigators combed for clues and questioned residents inside.
Police told CBS 2 that the child’s 18-year-old mother was arrested and charged with attempted murder.
Residents said they couldn’t believe that one of their neighbors could do such a thing.
“I don’t know what to say,” neighbor Simone Smith said. “I don’t know if she should be punished; I don’t know the whole story.”
Others were searching their mind for a reason for the disturbing incident.
“I don’t know man, had to have been a young girl, probably had a lot of problems,” resident William Jones said.
“Maybe depression…I don’t know,” Morales said.
The investigation centered on a basement door, where the trash chute ends and where police said a worker heard the baby crying.
“Common sense would have told her, if [she] didn’t want it, leave it in the hospital, have it put up for adoption, you know,” Jones said. “But doing something like that – it’s crazy.”
The infant was being treated at Brooklyn Hospital. He was expected to survive the fall.
New York State has a “safe haven” law that allows a parent to give up a baby within 30 days of birth, no questions asked, at local hospitals, firehouses and police stations.
