Newborn girl found in shopping cart outside Desert Springs Hospital

She wasn't quite a Safe Haven baby, but the important thing is - she's safe.

A healthy newborn baby girl was found outside Desert Springs Hospital Medical Center early Tuesday, authorities said.

The girl was found about 3:40 a.m. wrapped in a blanket inside a shopping cart, Las Vegas police said. A source said the girl's umbilical cord and the placenta were still attached.

A doctor arriving to perform emergency surgery found the baby outside the hospital, on Flamingo Road near Eastern Avenue, police said.

The baby was placed into protective custody and remained at the hospital Wednesday.

Although the drop-off did not technically fall within the legal scope of Nevada's Safe Haven law, which requires a parent to physically hand the child to authorities, child welfare officials considered the incident a positive result nonetheless.

"This isn't the best scenario or the appropriate use, but it's the best possible outcome that we could see," said Christine Skorupski, a spokeswoman for the Clark County Department of Family Services.

The Safe Haven law, enacted in 2001 after a series of infant deaths, allows parents to leave anonymously a child with emergency care providers within 30 days of the child's birth.

It's a "no questions asked" law that promises parents they won't be prosecuted or identified. The last documented case in Clark County happened in March, when a mother in her 20s dropped off a 22-day old baby at the emergency room of the St. Rose Dominican Hospital, San Martin campus.

In April 2010, a man left a 2-day-old boy at a fire station. That case was considered the first use of the law in Clark County.

But despite the protection the law offers, it is seldom-used, and babies continue to be left in trash bins or fall victim to fatal parental abuse.

As recently as October, a newborn girl was found dead in a trash bin in an east valley apartment complex. Medical examiners never determined whether the girl was alive at birth. The parents were never found.

Skorupski estimated the law has been used only "five or six times" since being enacted 11 years ago, with almost every case within the past two years.

"It hasn't been utilized to the extent we would all like to see," she said. "We'd rather see this than seeing children in Dumpsters or having cases of mothers drowning or suffocating their babies."

The state does not keep track of how many babies are surrendered each year.

Las Vegas detectives were investigating the case Wednesday to determine whether the girl was dropped off by a parent and hadn't been abducted.

"We have to make sure a parent willfully surrendered the child," Skorupski said. "Certain measures have to be taken."

For the drop-off to fall within the guidelines of the law, Skorupski said the parents should have entered the hospital and spoken to a nurse or doctor. The law doesn't require parents to release any information about themselves. They must be allowed to leave at any time without being followed.

In addition to hospitals, parents can lawfully leave babies at fire stations, police stations or medical centers.

Contact reporter Mike Blasky at mblasky@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0283.