Clues to unravelling the mystery of a baby’s body found in an Auckland recycling facility could lie in the camera footage and IT systems connected to the recycling trucks.
On the evening of Monday, August 16, the unclothed body of a newborn baby girl was found by sorters at the Visy recycling plant in Onehunga.
More than 100 trucks had delivered the waste they had collected from kerbsides in areas across Auckland that day.
Police are appealing to the public to assist in finding the baby’s mother.
The timing of the discovery of the full term baby’s body points to a strong possibility she came in on one of the last trucks to arrive at the recycling centre in the late afternoon.
Newsroom put it to Detective Inspector Scott Beard, who is heading the inquiry, that because the baby was discovered at night it would make sense the last trucks to arrive would be the initial focus of police attention. He agreed.
"We worked backwards and identified the registration of the trucks which tipped the recycling at the relevant time frame,” he said.
Newsroom can confirm the last five trucks to arrive at the centre were as follows: one from Waitakere - which involved the Piha, Karekare and Anawhata run - two from Rodney, one from South Auckland and one from Auckland central.
Police stress this doesn’t necessarily mean the baby was from any of these areas, but technology used by all recycling trucks could help uncover which bin the baby was placed in.
Cameras on board
Sophisticated fleet management software used by recycling truck companies includes multiple cameras on the vehicles. The contents of each bin is filmed and stored on hard drives and the bin’s location can potentially be geolocated and cross referenced to match its address.
The driver can view on a screen inside the cab the contents of the bins as they are emptied into the truck, and recordings are stored on secure servers by the companies for a period of time before being deleted.
Newsroom asked the police if they would be using this technology and watching the truck footage to try to determine the contents and address of each individual bin on any routes of interest.
“We have contacted all the companies whose trucks were at the recycling plant that day and sent a questionnaire. We are still waiting on all responses that we will input into a spreadsheet. That questionnaire is asking about police obtaining GPS and CCTV cameras etcetera,” said Beard.
Three companies are contracted by Auckland Council to service the super city’s kerbside recycling scheme, and all deliver their loads to the Onehunga facility for sorting.
A privacy statement uploaded by one of the three companies, EnviroWaste, says the video footage is collected and stored for health and safety reasons, route coordination, for driver training and in situations where they may need to assist police with investigations.
EnviroWaste services Waitākere, Henderson, Upper Harbour, Rodney, Whāu and Auckland central west and east.
Items of interest
Police have released a picture of a blue plastic bag found in the vicinity of the baby at the facility, with a number of adult, child and baby items of clothing inside. Police are unsure if the baby was originally in the plastic bag, but have sent it to forensics to test for DNA.
“When we found baby…there was a blue bag nearby and baby clothing in the bag. It has since been sent to ESR for testing.”
Police have also been visiting retail stores to ask whether they sell blue plastic bags of the same type, which appears to be the sturdy kind often found in food grade cleaning and food manufacturing settings.
Beard told Newsroom that when police deduced some trucks were of higher priority than others, they contacted the truck business owners early in the investigation.
“One particular truck had collected in the West Auckland area including Piha and Karekare, so we sent staff out to Piha to ask at the store regarding the blue bag.”
He also confirmed DNA profiling is being carried on the baby to see whether it could lead to the mother or someone who might know who she is, and pathology is still awaiting toxicology results for a cause of death.
Multiple offers of help with funeral arrangements have been provided by a number of business owners.
