1974 Connecticut Cold Case: Deceased Infant in a Suitcase

Editor’s Note: Patch is re-running this story in case you missed it the first time around.

NORWALK, CT - A one- to two-day-old deceased baby girl was discovered in suitcase in January 1974 in Norwalk, and police are asking for the public's help in solving the case.

The incident began when an 11-year-old boy, found a brick red-colored suitcase, with white trim, at about 4:10 p.m. on January 24 on Wilson Avenue near Ely Avenue by the old Wennik's building.

He remembered that the suitcase had not been there that morning when he walked to school, and he brought it home and opened it with his 12-year-old brother and 17-year-old sister.

It contained some baby toys and a brown paper bag with a dark plastic bag inside. Referred to as "Baby Jane Doe," the infant's body was discovered inside the plastic bag, and the scared children ran inside to tell their mother who contacted the police.

"Baby Jane Doe was a newborn female baby with the placenta and umbilical cord still attached," Norwalk police wrote in a Facebook post about the cold case. "The umbilical cord had been cut but not tied off. Baby Jane Doe was a full term newborn, weighing 7lbs 7 oz with black hair and was alive prior to blunt force trauma to the skull causing [her death]. The autopsy estimated that Baby Jane Doe was deceased for approximately a day or two so she would have been born on 1/22/71 or 1/23/71."

Below is additional information about the case from Norwalk police. Anyone with information about the deceased child is urged to contact Lt. Art Weisgerber at 203-854-3028 or at aweisgerber@norwalkct.org:

The brick red suitcase with white trim was a Jesus A. Ossam brand that is manufactured in Medellin, Colombia. The suitcase also contained a few toys, teething rings, and maps of Miami and Miami Beach, New Jersey, Connecticut and Rhode Island. The Miami maps have an area circled for Mendoza St./Ave, Hialeah Park, and Opa Locka area. The suitcase also contained a “printed circuit punch out” that may have been a G-10 manufactured by the Xexex Corporation on Duke Place.

An employee of Cook Laboratories reported to police that just around 4:00 pm on January 24th, 1974, he looked out the front of the building and observed a well dressed Hispanic or Italian descent female, 20-22 years old with shoulder length black hair walk in front of the building carrying a red and white suitcase. The woman was walking south on Ely Avenue, just south of Duke Place, and then made a right onto Wilson Avenue headed towards what is now, Martin Luther King Drive. About twenty minutes later, this same witness observed a young boy come from Wilson Ave carrying the same red and white suitcase. This boy and suitcase were later identified and confirmed.

The bus driver who had the Route 136 run indicated that on January 24th, 1974 around 3:30 pm he was flagged down by a well dressed Hispanic female in the area of Ely Avenue. He described the woman as 5’4” to 5’5” tall and about 23-27 years old wearing a light color coat with a fur collar. The woman got off the bus at the Norwalk Theater.

It is unknown if this woman is the birth mother of Baby Jane Doe or the person that disposed of the body of Baby Jane Doe.

Photos: Items discovered in the suitcase from the 1974 deceased child cold case. Photo credit: Norwalk Police Department