A young woman apparently tired of the responsibility, allegedly left her baby on a road in the Moscow region in the hope he would be driven over by a passing car. Fortunately, the baby boy was saved.
Twenty-three year old Elena is accused of trying to get rid of her 11-month-old son. The woman reportedly asked her brother Aleksandr, aged 20, to help. They are suspected of planning to leave the baby on the highway and wait until the first passing vehicle ran over him. But the plan came unstuck.
There is little known about the Osin family, members of which are alleged to have decided to get rid of the child. They lived in the city of Mytishchi but became homeless and spent the last several years in a tiny site container. The two by four square meter container was home to six people – Elena and her brother Aleksandr, their parents, Elena’s two-year-old son and her newborn.
When baby Roma was born, Elena’s family was enraged. They had no money, and the infant was crying all the time. Elena refused to tell her parents who Roma’s father was.
At around 1am on June 1, Elena and her brother are said to have set off in the direction of a highway. “Leaving a baby in such a place equals a murder,” said Irina Gumennaya, a Russian Investigations Directorate representative. “Though Elena claims she left Roma on the road in the hopes someone would pick up the child and adopt him”.
Aleksandr put the baby on the turning of a big highway where there were no lights. Big trucks drive fast at night there and it is almost impossible to notice a small bundle on the road. But miraculously the first driver that appeared managed to stop as she saw the boy; she also noticed youngsters hurrying away from the scene.
According to Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper, policewoman Anna Gavrilina found the baby on the highway at around 2am on June 1. Anna said the baby boy was still breathing so she called an ambulance and Roma was immediately taken to a nearby hospital.
Elena and her brother were found a little later in the nearby bushes – they seem to have been staying there watching the baby on the road.
“We first thought it was a kitten or a puppet, opened the bundle and saw a baby! We called the police and told them we found a child and can see two youngsters strolling off,” Dmitry Drozdov, an identifying witness, told Vesti TV channel.
Elena never managed to explain to the police what had made her leave her baby on the road.
The baby boy is now in hospital where he is undergoing rehabilitation.
“Small Roma has been examined by several doctors. At the moment we can say the child’s condition is satisfactory,” said Yury Mikhailyuk, head of the children’s intensive care unit of the Mytishchi municipal hospital. A psychiatrist is not sure the boy is in good condition – he says the child is excessively restless. The doctor hopes though the incident will have no negative effects on Roma’s psyche.
Both his mother and uncle were arrested and are awaiting trial. If they are found guilty and considered mentally competent, they could face life in jail.