On Tuesday morning, Station 21 in southwest Houston received an unexpected delivery. KTRK reports that a woman brought a baby to the fire station at 12:30 a.m. on Tuesday and surrendered the baby girl, believed to be just hours old.
Currently, authorities do not know if the woman who left the baby at the fire station is the girl’s mother. HPD Lt. Larry Crowson told KTRK, “At this point, CPS and HPD juvenile investigators will do a follow-up investigation to see if we can determine circumstances of how the child was dropped off at the fire station.”
Under Texas law, parents of a newborn can place a newborn child at an EMS station, fire station, or hospital without question or fear of prosecution. These places are designated safe havens under the Baby Moses Law, which was instituted to protect vulnerable newborns in difficult circumstances.
The need for Baby Moses laws has been sadly evident in the national news cycle in recent months. Over the summer a baby in Georgia, who became known as Baby India, was abandoned in the woods in a plastic bag. Another baby was discovered naked in the woods of Maryland. Closer to home, a baby boy was discovered in a suitcase abandoned next to a trash compactor in an Arlington, Texas apartment complex. In all of these instances, the babies were saved when passersby heard their cries and were courageous enough to investigate and intervene.
The abortion industry has told mothers in crisis the lie that their children’s life is their choice. The sad reality is that mothers in crisis feel they have no choice, and often opt to end their child’s life in abortion without realizing there is hope and there is help.
The harrowing stories of abandoned newborns show how deceitful the abortion industry has been in taking the lives of innocent children whose families think they are not prepared to raise them. The idea of abandoning a helpless and entirely dependent newborn baby shocks any thinking, feeling person. How could we believe that violently ending that innocent life before birth could ever be just?
These obvious facts are seen in the loving responses to the innocent children abandoned for death. Thousands of people across the nation offered to adopt Baby India, and police threw a baby shower for Baby Jason who was abandoned near a dumpster.
There is no doubting the full humanity and worthiness of protection of Baby India and Baby Jason when they were just hours out of their mothers’ wombs. They were not made human by being born; they were already fully human and worthy of care and protection before birth, when tens of thousands of babies like them have been legally killed.
At the same time as these tragic stories of potentially fatal abandonment occur, there are signs of hope. According to KTRK, the baby girl surrendered under the Texas Safe Haven law on Tuesday has been taken to Texas Children’s Hospital where she appeared to be in good health. Whatever the circumstances of her birth, someone made a decision to act in the child’s best interest and bring her to a safe place where she could receive adequate care.
In a similar story last week, someone surrendered a newborn at a Fort Worth fire station, which officials described as a “brave choice.”
When the lives of the voiceless and defenseless babies are on the line, all of us are called to make brave choices.
For readers outside Texas, find information about Safe Haven Laws in your state by visiting Baby Safe Haven or calling 1-888-510-BABY.