The "Garden of Angels" display in front of the office of Desert Lawn Cemetery. Curiously, the logo at the top of each headstone/cross is identical to that on the so-called "Safe Surrender" baby dump facility in Pomona that I'd photographed a few days before.
This is the view that one sees after parking their car and approaching the office.
This is the view from the area of the office door.
Desert Lawn's sign, a few feet from the edge of Interstate 10, says "Serving All Faiths." Pay no attention to the forest of crosses right next to the office. The "Garden of Angels" is advertised on two official-looking signs facing both directions along the service road.
The van parked in front of the "Garden of Angels" office in Yucaipa, California.
Closeup of the bumper sticker on the van.
The "Garden of Angels" at Desert Lawn Cemetery, Calimesa, California, and the signed/bumper stickered van parked in front of the "Garden of Angels" office, Yucaipa, California. May 5, 2003. Copyright © 2003 Michael T. Doughney.
Giving these children a name and not just a number and giving them the respect and dignity their parents wouldn't is a hell of a lot better than cremating them and dumping them in an unmarked mass grave with hookers and serial killers. And as for the safe haven law, it is a hell of a lot better to abandon a child in a place where it will be cared for than to dump it in a dumpter where it will freeze to death, suffocate, be eaten at by rats or god only knows what else. Anyone who opposes the law should have to walk a mile in Debbie Farris' shoes and have to look into the faces of these perfect little humans that someone thought no more of than an empty wrapper or a used tissue. Maybe abandoning your child is wrong, that is not so much the issue, it is an issue of deciding whether your child will live with people who can and will care for them, or die amongst garbage. Have a little bit of compassion and wake up to reality.
Posted by: Tiffaney on April 9, 2004 01:46 PM