A 32-year-old moth­er of two who al­leged­ly aban­doned her new­born ba­by two days be­fore Christ­mas will ap­pear be­fore a Tu­na­puna mag­is­trate this morn­ing. \

De­tec­tives of the Arou­ca Po­lice Sta­tion met with Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP) Roger Gas­pard, SC, yes­ter­day. He ad­vised them to charge the moth­er with the wil­ful aban­don­ment of her ba­by un­der Sec­tion 21 of the Of­fences Against the Per­son Act.

In­ves­ti­ga­tors were ini­tial­ly con­sid­er­ing charg­ing the woman un­der the Chil­dren Act, which al­so makes it an of­fence to aban­don a child.

The Of­fences Against the Per­son Act states: "Any per­son who un­law­ful­ly aban­dons or ex­pos­es any child un­der the age of two years so that the life of the child is en­dan­gered or the health of the child is or is like­ly to be per­ma­nent­ly in­jured, is li­able to im­pris­on­ment for five years."

Ac­cord­ing to re­ports, the ba­by boy was found on De­cem­ber 23 out­side the St Mary's Chil­dren's Home, Tacarigua, by guards who heard his cries.

The ba­by, who has not been named, re­mains un­der the care of nurs­es at the Wendy Fitzwilliam Pae­di­atric Hos­pi­tal, Mt Hope.

The child's moth­er, who al­so has two oth­er young chil­dren, was ar­rest­ed at her Tacarigua home on Tues­day evening by North­ern Di­vi­sion de­tec­tives. She re­mained de­tained the sta­tion up to late yes­ter­day.

Po­lice sources said while un­der in­ter­ro­ga­tion af­ter her ar­rest, the woman ad­mit­ted to leav­ing the child at the or­phan­age, say­ing she could not fi­nan­cial­ly sup­port an­oth­er child.

Asst Com­mis­sion­er Wayne Dick and Se­nior Supt David Abra­ham as­sist­ed with the in­ves­ti­ga­tion. The charge was laid by WPC Dick-Fran­cis.