A newborn baby girl is safe after her teenage mother walked into an El Patron restaurant in New Jersey, handed her off to patron Alease Scott and fled the scene.
The 14-year-old mother was reportedly in a panic when she walked into the Jersey City El Patron restaurant clutching a baby wrapped in a towel on Wednesday afternoon. The child reportedly still had part of her umbilical cord attached.
“This girl comes in asking for help,” Frankie Aguilar, the restaurant’s owner, told KRON4. “Really, like desperate eyes, asking ‘somebody,’ like, pleading, ‘Can you help me?’ She was asking for the firefighters. It was a very dangerous situation.”
After the girl walked in, she sat at a table and was eventually approached by Alease Scott, who was eating lunch with her boyfriend, Walter Cocca.
Scott, a preschool teacher, trained in first aid and CPR, asked if she could check the baby’s vitals. The girl handed the newborn over and eventually walked out of the restaurant. The incident, including the handoff, was caught by the restaurant’s CCTV cameras. Cocca also documented part of the experience for Facebook Live.
“At first, it was unreal,” Cocca said. “Then it became heartbreaking. It broke my heart. Just to think of the fact that this baby now has no parents.”
Scott took the baby to her table and checked her out. The little girl was having trouble breathing, but she was healthy otherwise. She received oxygen after police and first responders arrived at the scene. The baby was taken to a hospital and will be placed for adoption.
The 14-year-old was eventually located and initially claimed she wasn’t the child’s mother. She is not facing charges, according to NJ.com.
“I’m glad that she chose us because she could have chosen any other option,” Aguilar said. “But instead, she said — as a 14-year-old girl who had the mental capacity to come in and say, you know what — this baby needs a chance.”
Under New Jersey’s Safe Haven Infant Protection law, a parent can take an unharmed child to an emergency room, police station, fire station or first responder without persecution.
Hopefully, the teen will get some support instead of judgment.
