New York - UPI
A New York City resident said he was horrified to discover a child's severed foot on the lawn of his Queens home. Paul Lawrence found the foot Sunday afternoon while taking out the garbage at his home, the New York Post reported. "It looked just like a piece of meat, a skinless piece of meat with bone," said Lawrence, 49, a ground-floor resident of a three-family home in Queens. "I looked closer and decided it looked like a foot. Lawrence's next-door neighbor, Sheldon Pouchet, said it at first it appeared to be a Halloween prop, "but it wasn't." "I said, 'Let's let the [police] do their job and figure it out,'" Pouchet said. "If you see something like that, you don't touch it. You call forensics." Police later confirmed it was a human foot belonging to a 3- or 4-year-old. Neighbors on the block were shocked, the New York Daily News reported. "I live here by myself with my daughter -- that is freaking me out," said a woman who lives nearby. "I'm ready to move." "I think it's scary," said Debbie Bennett, 38, a mother of two who lives across the street. "I got goosebumps as soon as the detective told me. I'm scared." Police and cadaver dogs searched the area for several hours Saturday evening, but found no other body parts. "I'm not sure if it fell out of the bag, or if it was near it," Lawrence said. "I feel bad for whoever it belongs to."