NEW YORK (AP) — Three children were found dead on the beach near Brooklyn’s famed Coney Island boardwalk early Monday and police believe they may have been drowned by their mother.
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The bodies of the 7-year-old boy, 4-year-old girl and 3-month-old boy were found after a nearly three-hour search that began at 1:40 a.m. when a relative called police, worried the woman intended to harm her children.
The mother, identified by family members as 30-year-old Erin Merdy, was found 90 minutes later, barefoot and soaking wet, 2 miles (3 kilometers) down the boardwalk from the section of Coney Island where she lived.
Detectives were trying to question Merdy at the local police precinct house.
“So far, she’s not said anything,” said New York Police Department Chief of Department Kenneth Corey.
The search for the children intensified after the mother was found alone. Police sent in a helicopter and marine units. The children were found at the water’s edge shortly after 4:30 a.m. on a quiet section of beach about 13 blocks from the stadium where the Brooklyn Cyclones minor league baseball team plays.
Efforts to revive the children at a nearby hospital failed, Corey said.
Relatives identified the children as Zachary, 7, Liliana, 4 and Oliver, 3 months.
Merdy’s mother, Jacqueline Scott, 56, told the Daily News that her daughter was a loving mother but had been having a rough time recently.
“She might have been going through postpartum depression,” Scott told the newspaper. “She was a good mother.”
Scott said she tried to talk to her daughter Sunday.
“I reached out to her yesterday and she said she was doing laundry and I said I wanted to speak to the kids,” Scott said. “I tried to call her twice on the phone after that and there was no answer.”
The children’s bodies were found three blocks from Merdy’s apartment building, where police had first gone when the search began. Corey said officers had canvassed the beach and the boardwalk, searched neighborhood streets and checked the local hospital in the hunt for the children before the mother was found on the boardwalk.
As they continued to search the area, police found a shoe in the water and bagged it as evidence.
A security supervisor for Merdy’s building said the family had moved in less than a year ago. Corey said the mother had not been reported to authorities previously for abusing or neglecting her children.
A decision hadn’t been made about what criminal charges Merdy might face.
This is the most tragic news. A horrible nightmare for humanity
What moronic comments about the inexplicable murders of her own children by an apparently mentally ill woman. Abortion, race and school attended have nothing to do with this tragedy.
This poor woman is obviously suffering from a mental disorder (possibly postpartum depression, given that she had a 3-month-old). Once she receives proper mental care and emotional support, the horror that she inflicted upon her unfortunate children will probably haunt her for the rest of her life.
This is an unspeakable tragedy that is not typical of non-Jewish mothers any more than of Jewish mothers. There is no reason to take advantage of and politicize this awful situation.
if the mother is allowed to kill her children, unborn , because its her body
why shouldnt we take it a step further like why should she not have the power to smother her children if shes …
that what the the heretics say, next step is abolish incest,. if there is no god and everything goes
Incredible tragedy. But some “frum” posters are celebrating. Not very Torahdik, nu?
More VIN people trivializing someone else’s tragedy.
Is the mother a product of the public school? Or chasidish school?
How could the father of these small children allow such a tragic travesty to occur? why did he not protect his children? Where was he?
Very normal thing in this world. Her body, her choice. No difference if the children are before or after birth.
This is the logic of nowadays.
Kathy Hochul must be thinking what additional asinine laws and decrees she could make to prevent such a thing from happening again.
waiting for the idiot to say, “SHELOONEE?
Naturally it’s all because of racism, climate change, and Trump. And cuz of the Jews to be thrown in for good measure.
American culture
It wasn’t worth it 4 her
Her choice
Her body
Her produce
Maybe she thought she had rotten produce.
Tossed them out
She can always make more if she wants
So she thinks
Cheap product
Easy to produce
Don’t like it?
Toss it out, what do u care?
To u
They’re worthless
Product of American culture
Right
Why not?
Big expense
Pain in the .. .
Not making it
So drop the expense
Life means nothing to you
Now u can afford a penthouse
It’s all about what works 4 u
Sad