Document B8QDVr8kgve08kyMgJpK0jO98

420 Lexington Avenue New York 17, N. Y. MANFRED BOWDITCH DIRECTOR OF HEALTH AND SAFETY m- June 20, 1956 COPIED FROM THE AMERICAN HERITAGE CENTER, UNIVERSITY OE WYOMING. THIS MATERIAL MAY BE RESTRICTED BY UNITED STATES COPYRIGHT LAW. IT IS THE RESPONSIBILITY OE THE RESEARCHER TO OBTAIN COPYRIGHT APPROVAL PRIOR TO QUOTATION OR PUBLICATION. Mr. Jerome Trichter Assistant Commissioner N. Y. City Department of Health 125 Worth Street lew York 13, New York Dear Jerry: I suppose you saw the end g story in yesterday's Herald Tribune. 1 Though lead has ipX in the picture, it is one that seems to me to aringjsn the problem of childhood lead poisoning, for it i ling that the great majority of our New York City cases from thii jstratum of our population. How is the warn; 'required by your Department going to mean anything^to~p^opie ~bu5h~ag^Mese, or how, for that matter, is the parental exudation that weaovocate to be put across to them? Our slums, hut regional mee' importance step and should ective should of course be to get rid of our at your proposal of some years ago to hold. .ty's paint dealers and educate them to the would do more than any one other preventive out. Sincerely yours. MB:GW Enclosure cc: Dr* Wheatley COPIED PROM THE AMERICAN HERITAGE CENTER. UNIVERSITY OP WYOMING. THIS MATERIAL MAY BE RESTRICTED BY yNITED STATES COPYRIGHT LAW. IT IS THE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE RESEARCHER TO OBTAIN COPYRIGHT APPROVAL PRIOR TO QUOTATION OR PUBLICATION. </ t NEW YORK HERALD TRIBUNE, TUESDAY, JUNE 19, 1956 Mother in Bellevue, 2 Babies Starve, Die By Martin G. Berck the mother of seven children, A Welfare Department worker five of them in Catholic institu on a routine call yesterday tions. found the bodies of two babies The welfare worker, Martin who' apparently had been left Lutenberg, called at her three- alone and starved to death after room sixth-floor rear apartment their mother was taken to the at 306 E. 32d St. shortly before Bellevue Hospital psychiatric S pa. He said he entered--the ward eight days ago. door was unlocked--when no Police tentatively identified one answered his knock and the children as Josephina Velez, found the place - piled deep in one year and cine months, and dust and litter. her brother, Antonio, eight Mr. Lutenberg, spotting the months. girl lying dead in her crib, Chief of Detectives James B. raced down the building's iron Leggett, who launched an im- staircase and summoned police. njediate investigation with The dead baby boy was found Chief inspector Thomas Neilson, later in a carriage in the same said the mother, Mrs. Anastasia room. Rios Martinez Velez, thirty-two; s The welfare worker, who had was. incoherent when she was been making a routine check, picked up and neither the police last visited the Velez family on is any laxity, we won't hide it, nor hospital authorities knew! June 1. you can be sure of that." that she was on reliefer that she Assistant Chief' Medical Ex Mrs. Velez, questioned at had children at home. aminer EmanuelJNeuren said a Bellevue last night, said she had Mrs. Velez, police said, was preliminary examination indi left the children, in the care of cated the children died last a Woman neighbor, whose name Thursday or Friday from lack was withheld. Police said the of food. An autopsy has been neighbor denied that and added ordered for today. that she had not seen Mrs. On June 10 Mrs. Velez was Velez i'er more than a month. picked up by police of the E. Other neighbors in the dingy 22d St. Station after she had tenement described Mrs. Velez allegedly kicked out the plate- as a short, wiry woman who glass window of the Murray Hill kept to herself and was friend Beer Tavern at 603 E. 26th St. ly with no one in the building. Chief Leggett said their rec Mrs. Velez, it was said, was ords at the station house showed often heard shouting; at her. two no known address or relatives children. No one apparently for the woman. He said police noticed her eight-day absence, iwere notified the next day that however. she had given Bellevue authori A Bellevue Hospital spokes ties an address that did not man said that Mrs. Velez, on ad exist. v mission to the hospital, had said Police of the Missing Persons nothing about having any chil Bureau spoke to her at Bellevue dren. "She was an incoherent Hospital, but finding her inco person and I don't assume we herent, were not able to ascer even knew she was on relief," the tain her real address, the chief Spokesman said. said. She was brought to the hospi Detectives said they learned tal for observation and normally tonight from Welfare Depart would be kept ten to fourteen ment records that Mrs. Velez had days, he said. been separated last February from her husband, Jose Velez, > who is believed to be staying somewhere in New Jersey. The couple came from Puerto Rico eight years ago and has been on relief since August, 1953, ac cording to the records. Police records indicated Mrs, Velez had reported her husband missing last March 26, but the Missing Persons Bureau later listed the case as one of aban donment. Chief Leggett said that "when all the facts are found, if there , N1364M1