Newborn baby found buried alive in Eunos
A newborn baby boy was found buried alive with a trash bag twisted like a rope around his neck in a rooftop garden of a Eunos Crescent block.
Retiree Tay Kim Sia, 60, was having a smoke atop multi-storey carpark Block 31A on Monday when he heard a mewing noise coming from the garden.
To his horror, he found a baby buried in a shallow grave. The infant's mouth was stuffed with mud and dried leaves, and he still had his umbilical cord attached.
The baby has since been taken to the KK Women's and Children's Hospital and is in stable condition.
The police are trying to track down the baby's next of kin.
Tay told The Straits Times (ST) that he was smoking at the sixth-floor garden when he heard soft mews.
Speaking in Mandarin, the father of 11 said, "I thought there was a cat in trouble, so I pushed the bushes aside to look around.
"Then I saw a little foot sticking out of the soil. I told my friend who was smoking nearby, and he said it must be a battery-operated soft toy, and that I should not bother about it."
However, the senior citizen still hopped onto the waist-high planter and dug the baby out with his bare hands.
He then brought the baby into the Tembusu Seniors Activity Centre on the same floor where the latter was cleaned and had the trash bag around his neck removed.
The senior citizens in the centre described the wide-eyed baby as dark-skinned, beautiful and healthy. It was also noted that he looked barely a few hours old.
Droplets of blood were discovered at a nearby stairwell, but it is not known if the baby was delivered there.
Police found some bloodied clothes, bunched up and hidden in the bushes just a few metres away from where the newborn was found.
Those found guilty of child abandonment can be jailed up to seven years and fined.
