Baby girl’s body found inside donation box

LONDON - The body of a baby girl has been found inside a clothes donation box shipped to a warehouse in the US state of Texas, a media report said Sunday.

The dead baby was discovered at a warehouse in McAllen, Texas, Thursday as workers sorted through clothing shipped from metropolitan Phoenix, Daily Mail reported.

Investigators said the results of an autopsy had failed to determine whether the baby was born alive or was stillborn, Phoenix police sergeant Steve Martos said.

The child was wrapped in a towel, placed in a cardboard box and left in one of nearly 400 donation boxes in retail store car parks across the region between Dec 8 and last Sunday. Her umbilical chord was still attached.

Collected clothing and household items were sorted in the Arizona city and the clothes were sent to Intex Ropa Usada in Texas Wednesday. The dead child was apparently not noticed by the crew working in Phoenix.

Homicide detectives assigned to the case were working to narrow down where the child was left to a smaller number of donation boxes.

Martos said: “But even if we narrow it down to a hundred, it’s still a challenge for us to determine which of the hundred.”

They were also hoping to find clues from the box itself.

Martos said they were unlikely to solve the case without a tip from the public.