PORT ANGELES — A deceased newborn infant recovered from a large trash container by police last week has been named.
Thomas Loy Last is the name given to the baby boy by his maternal grandmother, Dawn Harris, said Douglas Ticknor, Drennan & Ford Funeral Home director, on Friday.
He said Harris, of Pueblo, Colo., named Thomas after members of her family. He said she did not want to comment.
The boy’s mother, 16-year-old Lauryn Louise Last of Port Angeles, was charged on Wednesday with first-degree murder, with an alternative for second-degree murder, in Clallam County Superior Court for his death.
Port Angeles police, with assistance from Pierce County authorities and Olympic Peninsula Narcotics Enforcement Team officers, found a newborn baby’s body in a 30-ton trash container near Tacoma.
The container was located at a Waste Connections Inc. dump site in Tacoma and transported to a private dump in nearby Graham to be searched.
The dead infant’s alleged father is a man in his 30s in Pueblo, Colo., where Lauryn Last lived recently with her mother. She moved to Port Angeles to live with her father on 12th Street in October.
Ticknor said the funeral home was asked to oversee a private funeral service for the baby by a relative.
Harris and other family members from outside the state will attend the funeral, he said, but he did not know if authorities will allow Lauryn Last to be present.
“This is just a very tragic event for all parties concerned,” Ticknor said.
“Our interest is in giving this little boy a proper send-off.”
Flowers for Thomas’ funeral can be sent to the funeral home, 260 Monroe Road, Port Angeles, until Monday.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
