Photo: getty
“It’s an event that we don’t see very often because there are safe haven laws,” Judd said in avideo postedto the sheriff’s office Facebook page on Sunday.
In Florida, safe haven laws allow individuals to surrender unharmed newborns up to a week old, Judd said.
“We believe she is of Hispanic descent, and we need to know who the parents are,” Judd said. “We have worked throughout the community, and no one claims to know who the mother is. From experience, usually it’s a younger person who does not want the child or has somehow hidden the presence of the child from their parents, and now they’ve abandoned this child in the woods all alone.”
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“I was really surprised that they left apoor little girlon the [ground],” said her daughter, 12-year-old Eulalia Gregorio.
Judd called the Gregorio family “true heroes” for the life-saving discovery.
“She is not required to take the child if she doesn’t want the child,” Judd said, adding: “We will hold her accountable because she left this child abandoned in the woods, ostensibly, to die.”
“Certainly, we saved this person from a homicide charge,” Judd said. “Had that child laid out there and died, then we would be talking about a murder investigation. Now, we are not.”
Judd said the agency will continue to search for the child’s mother in the community.
“We have gone door to door, and so far no one has cooperated,” Judd said.
“There’s still a lot of work to do, and over the weekend we just gathered evidence,” he said.
“All the pieces came together for that child to end up alive, healthy and well, and I look forward to that time that child is in college, and who knows… maybe that’s the little girl who finds the cure to all these horrible diseases in some lab in the future,” Judd said.
source: people.com
