Detectives Seek Information on Infant Cold Case Known as "Baby Blue"

Credit: Press of Atlantic City

MAYS LANDING – Cold Case detectives continue the search for the parents of an unidentified infant locally known as “Baby Blue”, whose body was found washed up on the Ventnor beach nearly a decade ago, Acting Atlantic County Prosecutor Jim McClain announced.

On Jan. 17, 2004, a yellow laundry bag washed up on the beach at Suffolk Avenue in Ventnor. A man walking on the beach found the bag and dragged it to the boardwalk area where he opened it. 

Inside the laundry bag was a sealed black plastic bag. When opened, it contained another bag with the body of a dead newborn female with the placenta and umbilical cord still attached. Two other bags were also found in close proximity, which may have been used to weigh the laundry bag down in a failed attempt to sink the body.

An autopsy determined the cause of death to be asphyxia due to strangulation. A DNA profile was completed, which resulted in the determination that the baby was 61-percent European Caucasian and 39-percent Asian.

The infant became known as “Baby Blue” following the creation of the Baby Blue Foundation—a local charity created to give the baby a proper burial, which was founded by the woman whose husband discovered her.

To date, the birth mother and witnesses to this crime have never been located. Detectives from the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office Cold Case Unit and the Ventnor City Police Department continue to search for anyone with information.

Anyone with information pertaining to this homicide is urged to call the Cold Case Unit at (609)-909-7800 or the Ventnor City Police Department at (609)-822-2101.

In New Jersey, the Safe Haven Infant Protection Act allows for unwanted newborns to be dropped off safely, legally and anonymously at any hospital or police station and later adopted. For more information visit: www.njsafehaven.org.

Anyone with information involving serious crimes is asked to call the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office at 609-909-7800 or go to the Prosecutor’s Office Web site at http://www.acpo.org/tips.html and provide information by filling out the form anonymously on the Submit a Tip page. People can also call Crime Stoppers at 609-652- 1234 or 1-800-658-8477 (TIPS) or visit the Crime Stoppers Website at http://www.crimestoppersatlantic.com/. Crime Stoppers offers cash rewards for information leading to the arrest and indictment of those who commit crimes in Atlantic County.