Shocked kitchen porter found baby on boot of car

BLOODIED, naked but serene, baby Sophia’s wriggling caught the eye of kitchen porter Matt Shields.

With dark, downy hair and blue eyes, she was wrapped in a dirty blanket and hidden in a scruffy holdall bag sitting on the boot of Matt’s Audi A4.

Having only returned to pick up his phone, Mr Shields jumped back, thinking this was a prank. Only when he opened the holdall and Sophia’s tiny foot stuck out did he understand.

Four years, three months later, Mr Shields still remembers the peaceful air of a baby then called Sophia and how it disguised the trauma which minutes earlier saw her mother abandon her — never to return.

“She was naked and covered in blood, all hard-dried blood from the birth I suppose, and what looked to be the umbilical was still attached. I suppose the blanket was white at one stage but the bag and the whole lot was dirty.

“She was so calm, a real lovely child. She was all wrinkled and there wasn’t a sound out of her. The doctors said she was just after being fed so she wasn’t crying at all.”

Detectives from Anglesea Street have pored over the blurred security camera footage capturing the minutes before Baby Sophia was left in the car park of the South Infirmary Hospital at 12.45pm on October 13, 2003.

She was discovered just inside the main gate, 30 yards from the emergency room door, but Mr Shields said there would have been no time for any long goodbye between Sophia and her mother. “I was only at the car five minutes beforehand so she must have come in then. It could only have been a matter of minutes.

“I came out with one of the lads and I remembered I left my mobile phone in the car so I went to get it. When I went over I saw the bag moving. I jumped.

“There was loads of building work going on at the time so there were plenty of lads about. I just thought one of them had put a cat in the bag.

“I called one of the lads and then just went over and looked inside. Then I saw her little foot and I knew straight away,” said Mr Shields, from Belvelly near Cobh.

“I was in total shock. I just picked up the bag and ran straight to the emergency room,” he said.

He has often thought about Sophia and her mother, who felt unable to become a parent.

“She must have been going through something awful. She was probably only a child herself. Sure, it is terrible to think about her leaving that day and probably nobody to help her.

“I have often asked the staff here if they have heard anything,” he added.