Two Suffolk police officers, Paul DiCostanzo and Mark DeMarco, arrived on the lonely West Babylon street minutes after the call. A little before 1 a.m., a female voice had told dispatchers that persons "unknown" had placed a cloth bundle in the bushes there.
Their lights swept the 3-foot tall weeds, DeMarco recalled later, and the beams soon caught a flash of movement.
A pale leg appeared and, above it, the tiny face of an abandoned newborn.
DeMarco immediately radioed for an ambulance. "I am a father and, as police officers, we do hold children very dear to us," he said. DeMarco is an 11-year veteran of the force with children ages 9, 7 and 4. Police said the newborn's mother, Katheryn Longendyke, 22, made the call shortly after abandoning the child steps away from her West Babylon home.
She chose a forgotten patch of ground -- wedged between an on-ramp and back street -- where police say locals often dump trash.
There, among the litter, police found the 6-pound infant squirming inside her swaddling of colored bath towels. DeMarco said she never once cried out.
The officers unwrapped the infant and found her skin cool, ashen and smeared with blood. The umbilical cord seeped from where it had been freshly severed, he said. With gauze from their first-aid kit, DiCostanzo tied off the wound. Police later said the 18-inch-long baby had survived significant loss of blood.
"The quick response and quick thinking of these officers saved this child's life," Det. Insp. Mark Griffiths would later tell reporters at a news conference at Suffolk police headquarters in Yaphank Tuesday.
Police declined to say who would take custody of the infant, but said she is expected to make a full recovery at Good Samaritan Hospital Medical Center in West Islip.
The fate of the baby's mother, however, remained uncertain.
First Squad detectives found Longendyke after tracing the telephone call to her, and discovered that she'd given birth to the child at home, police said -- not far from where the child was found. Longendyke was admitted Tuesday to Good Samaritan for evaluation, and charges are expected pending her release.
A family member approached by Newsday at the hospital declined to comment.
Police said they were investigating why Longendyke abandoned the child on 18th Street near Straight Path -- rather than take her to any number of legally designated "safe havens" in Suffolk, where newborns can be left with no questions asked -- but they declined to release any details.
Neighbors are struggling to reconcile what they know about Longendyke with the sad tale police have told.
"This is completely out of character," said Brian Cody, 20, who attended West Babylon High School with Longendyke and lives on her block.
"She was probably so panicked she didn't know what to do," said Casey Nacarlo, 19, also an alum of West Babylon High. "She's a real nice girl with a real nice family."
Others, parents themselves, are struggling to understand what forces would drive a mother to forsake her child. "I'm sure she had a change of heart -- she called the cops," said Gerard Pico, 44. "I have a baby at home. I can't imagine looking at my little baby and saying, 'Let's throw it away.'"
Be the first to know when news breaks.