Where to Bury Abandoned Babies Debated

Debi Faris says she remembers the story of each of the 48 children she’s buried. Since 1996, she has been recovering the bodies of murdered and abandoned babies throughout Los Angeles, San Bernardino and Riverside counties and burying them in her private Garden of Angels in Riverside County’s Calimesa Cemetery.

“Every child has a story,” said Faris, 46, of Yucaipa. “And every child is given a name. We give them a proper burial service to build a circle of love around the child. The children belong to all of us.”

But Faris, who has worked closely with investigators at the Los Angeles County coroner’s office for more than five years, feels she is being pushed aside by a larger, more powerful organization that recently expressed interest in caring for the abandoned babies in Los Angeles County.

County officials say they are considering a proposal that would allow members of the Los Angeles County Funeral Directors Assn. to bury newborns found in local areas, but are uncertain when a decision will be made.

Representatives from the association say communities are better served if newborns recovered in Los Angeles County are buried in cemeteries that serve the communities where they are found.

“It doesn’t make sense to bury children in [Riverside County] if they passed away in our communities,” said Robert Risher, a media representative for the association. “For example, if the infant is Hispanic and was found in a predominantly Latin community, we’d work with a Catholic archdiocese cemetery to arrange a burial.”

Risher said the headstones would be marked John or Jane Doe. There would be an inscription indicating where and when the baby was found.

The marked name is just one thing Faris has taken issue with. “These children stand for something out there. What would they stand for in graves marked John and Jane Doe?” she said. “I’ll be damned if I stand still for that. If we take away the power for the children’s voices, then shame on us.”

Faris, who has three adult children, said she was moved to create the Garden of Angels and Safe Arms for Newborns organization while watching the evening news in 1996. Police had recovered a newborn boy who had been thrown along the side of a freeway, stuffed in a duffel bag.

“It compelled me to stop in my life and do something,” Faris said. She founded the not-for-profit organization and became a vocal advocate, lecturing at school assemblies and at colleges. Two years ago, her organization was instrumental in getting a state law passed that allows mothers to leave unwanted newborns anonymously at hospital emergency rooms within 72 hours of birth without threat of prosecution.

The Garden of Angels has three full-time employees, including Faris, and an eight-member board of directors. The organization has a $200,000 annual operating budget, according to financial secretary Sheryl Odell. The funding comes from grants and donations; most of the money raised goes to an educational and advertising campaign to publicize the 1-year-old law.

Though Faris said her aim is to prevent mothers from abandoning unwanted children, much of her work revolves around the tidy garden in Calimesa, lined with crosses bearing the names of the children she’s buried. Faris purchased the burial space--originally with room for 40 graves--in 1996 for $27,000. Over the years, the organization purchased enough space to bury 95 infants, she said.

Thirty-six of the 48 children buried there are from Los Angeles County, Odell said.

Law enforcement officials frequently call Faris when a dead infant is found. Faris often asks the investigators to name the children, although sometimes Faris and her husband, Mark, select names.

She personally retrieves each child from the coroner’s office and wraps the baby in donated blankets, blue or pink depending on the child’s gender. At each memorial, a clergy person, usually a board member or someone from the community, delivers a brief message. A volunteer usually reads a poem dedicated to the child. And the small group that gathers at the site sings special songs. At the end of the service, Faris releases a collection of doves--one for each child buried in the garden.

“I used to think that I was giving something to them,” she said of the children. “But each of them leaves something very special with me.”

Last month, when Faris arrived at the coroner’s office to retrieve the bodies of “Francis” and “Christian,” newborns discovered in Hollenbeck area Dumpsters in October, officials refused to release the bodies to her. They said the L.A. County Funeral Directors Assn. was assuming that responsibility, Faris recalled.

County officials relented, releasing the infants in time for a Dec. 23 memorial. But Craig Harvey, the coroner’s chief of operations, said the office still is interested in working with the funeral directors association.

Representatives of the association said they’ve been trying, without much success, to donate services for the last seven years. Larry Hawkins, past president of the association and chairman of the group’s Coroner’s Committee, said he first submitted a proposal to the administrative director of the coroner’s office, Tony Hernandez, in 1995 outlining a plan to provide caskets, funeral services and space to bury abandoned newborns. The group never received approval.

The organization, which has 90 members, tried again in 1998, Hawkins said, but nothing happened. In February, the association submitted a third proposal. “In the meantime, Debi Faris came on the scene and has been involved with the babies,” Hawkins said.

“We finally put it to Mr. Hernandez that we got the feeling he didn’t want us involved. He apologized, but said whatever happened, the Garden of Angels would have to be involved,” Hawkins said.

Hawkins and other members of the group say that although they commend Faris for the work she’s done, they are “concerned that babies are being taken 100 to 250 miles away.”

“It has always been my belief that babies should be buried in the geographic areas where they are found,” Hawkins said.

“Why should we have to send angels to another area to be buried?” asked Risher, corporate president of Risher Montebello Mortuary. “Usually babies are found in the area where their families live. Having services here can maybe do something to help their families. We can publicize the story of what happened to these children locally.”

Harvey said he is working out a rotation schedule that would allow the Garden of Angels and the funeral directors association to bury the babies.

Harvey said he’s convinced that Faris “does her work out of love” for the children, but he’s spoken to representatives of the association who have assured him that they will provide the same “level of service” that Faris has provided.

Still, Jean Huston, justice deputy to county Supervisor Michael Antonovich, said the Board of Supervisors will make the final decision because the coroner’s office falls under its auspices. Huston doesn’t know when the board will act.

“It’s all very much up in the air,” Huston said.

Until the board makes a decision, all the babies will be released to the Garden of Angels organization, Huston said.