‘You’re not in trouble’: Police desperate to find mum of abandoned baby

Detectives are reviewing CCTV footage from around the neighbourhood where a newborn baby was abandoned in Blacktown two weeks ago.

The detective tasked with unearthing the identity of an abandoned baby girl believes the answer lies in the community where she was found.

Two weeks after the tiny newborn was found in a Blacktown backyard, detective Inspector Jason Pietruszka admitted police still did not have a single lead on who her mum was, but that they “craved” answers.

It comes as the baby was due to be placed in foster care, having spent the past fortnight in Blacktown Hospital after becoming unwell.

Inspector Pietruszka said police were trying to find a match to the little girl’s DNA and that it was unclear from her appearance what ethnicity she was.

Detectives are also reviewing hours of CCTV footage from around the neighbourhood where the newborn was discovered in the early hours of April 21.

House where the baby was abandoned. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Jeremy Piper

Inspector Pietruszka said he believed residents in the Bankstown and Doonside areas likely held the key to the baby’s identity.

“As investigators, that’s what we crave, the truth about the circumstances surrounding this case,” he told The Saturday Telegraph.

The baby was abandoned on the doorstep of this Blacktown residence. Picture: Julian Andrews.

“We want to know what has occurred, what’s the back story behind it.

“It’s sure to be quite sad, tragic, but that’s why we are police officers, to find the truth so we can help. We don’t have the answers at the moment and that is frustrating, but we are appealing at a grassroots level for people in this proud community to come forward.”

Inspector Pietruszka said there had not been one solid lead since the baby was found on a cushion in a yard filled with toys and play equipment.

The baby remains in hospital, her release into foster care delayed after she became unwell, sources said.

Inspector Jason Pietruszka is desperate to find the baby.

She is now “doing well” and will soon be placed into foster care. If nobody comes forward, eventually the little girl will be adopted out. Inspector Pietruszka’s team is now trawling through hours of security footage, hoping for a clue. Police are also trying to find a match using DNA.

“The DNA obviously looks at the child’s link through any of our systems where there may be similar DNA,” Inspector Pietruszka said. “I am confident a match or a link will come up at some point in the future but we want to know what happened now. We don’t want to speculate about ethnicity;

“The baby is young and her features are not fully developed. We are more interested in people in the community reporting anything that seems unusual, someone that is in trouble or acting out of the ordinary.”

Detective Pietruszka stressed that the mum coming forward did not mean she had to care for the baby or take responsibility. “We want her not to panic or feel pressured, but to know there are options,” he said. We want her to have the chance to be in the baby’s life in some small way, to have the option or at least just to know that her baby is doing well and for us to know that she is doing OK.”