By Danny Teigman
The call, which reported "baby not breathing," crackled over the speaker, momentarily taking his own breath away. Calls like this had come over the radio before, but this time it was different.
Lying dead in a Hempstead courthouse toilet was a 6-pound, 4-ounce, day-old infant - then the county's latest victim of one of the most disturbing of crimes, that of neonaticide, the murder of a child under the age of one.
Days later, a funeral was held for "Angelica Hope," the name given to the infant, complete with a full honor guard. Sadly, Angelica became the first in a series of three more cases of abandonment and death spread over three months to which Jaccard had to personally respond.
One baby was found in a plastic bag in Albertson, and another was unearthed by a dog, found buried in a shallow grave in a person's backyard. Another infant turned up in a Lawrence dumpster.
"I said to myself, 'What the hell is going on here?'" Jaccard said. ..."The miracle that these women are carrying inside them - it would be a blessing gift to a couple that were unable to fulfill their family dreams [by having a child of their own]."
One of those families was his own, he explained to an audience of some 20 South Shore residents at the St. Agnes Parish Center in Rockville Centre on April 24.
Just before Angelica's discovery, his step-daughter, Rosemary was trying to conceive, wanting nothing more than to have a child of her own. The same day Angelica was found, Rosemary had a miscarriage.
Seeing both extremes of sorrow, Jaccard said, is what inspired him to begin his quest to protect the lives of unwanted children and to protect the rights of mothers by founding the Bellmore-based not-for-profit, New York Children of Hope Safe Haven program.
Through its volunteers' counseling efforts, he said, cases of neonaticide have fallen dramatically, averaging 16 a year nationally before 1999, to less than three a year. In 2002, there were no reported infant murders.
"It's just heart-wrenching to see those babies," said Jane O'Neill, a Rockville Centre resident who came to hear Jaccard speak. "It was nice to see the progress that's been made."
"I'm going to call and volunteer tomorrow," added Kathleen Hess, who is a retired nurse. "This is something that we have to get more information out about."
On July 18, 2001, thanks in part to Jaccard's continued lobbying efforts, New York became the second state after Texas to adopt a baby safe haven law, or a "Baby Moses" law as it is known in some states. In New York, women who leave their infants in the hands of any responsible person or drop off their newborns - not older than five days - at police stations, fire houses, hospitals or places of worship, will not be charged with child abandonment.
"In the beginning it was heart-wrenching," he said. "Now that we have established the program with a crisis center, we are seeing less deaths and more of the safe relinquishments and parenting plans."
Before the law change, women who were convicted of child abandonment could have faced up to four years in prison.
Jaccard, 57, grew up in Wantagh and graduated from Farmingdale Agricultural College, now SUNY Farmingdale, with a degree in horticultural design. After opening several flower shops in Massapequa Park and Bellmore, Jaccard became a medical officer with the Nassau County Police Department, studying at Nassau Community College and at Nassau University Medical Center in East Meadow.
Thus far, 47 states have adopted similar laws to New York and Texas, a legacy, Jaccard said, that has saved countless lives. "I wanted to give women an option to be able to walk away as a last resort without fear of penalty," he said.
Comments about this story? DTeigman@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 246.
