Strangers attend funeral for abandoned babies
INSIDE EDITION - Strangers stood near seven little, flower-covered graves as they honored the lives of infants whose bodies were never claimed.
Through the “Garden of Innocence,” founded by Elisa Davey, the children will no longer go unnamed and can go into the ground knowing they were cared about.
Davey makes it her mission to give names and proper burials to deceased babies abandoned in morgues and hospitals.
On this particular Saturday in the “Garden of Innocence” in Ventura, California, babies Ariel, Daisy, Don, Emily, Grace, John V. and Maguerite were put to rest, each with a back story of their own.
Baby Ariel was reportedly found preserved in a jar marked "plant materials" in one of the labs at Moorpark College, according to the organization, but no one knew where the 1-year-old was born or whom she belonged to.
After a nine-month investigation, it never became clear why she ended up there, according to Davey.
But Davey said they waited on baby Ariel during the nine months and Saturday was finally her time for her funeral.
“It was bittersweet knowing we are going to lay to rest a child who was found in a jar,” said Davey. “A lot of people ask us how we can bury babies. ‘It’s so hard.’ Our answer is, 'how can we not?'"