Landlord empties last home of abandoned child
By: Vic Monaco
HIGHTSTOWN Mike Vanderbeck thought it was time.
More than seven weeks had passed since his tenant Amy Giordano had disappeared and her toddler Michael Digirolamo had been found abandoned outside a Delaware hospital.
Packing up your own belongings is often a trying, even dreaded mission.
Packing up someone else’s things is usually a task taken on for only the very best of friends.
Sorting through the belongings of an abandoned baby and a mother most people fear is dead is something Mr. Vanderbeck will never forget.
But it was time, so he and representatives of the Greater Goods Thrift Store this week packed up the belongings of the 27-year-old single mother and her now 1-year-old son, who remains in foster care.
They did so while Ms. Giordano’s cell phone base continued to blink with 30 messages. On the walls of the third-floor apartment at 108 Mercer St. was her artwork, mostly of flowers on framed paper towels or pieces of thin wood. A notice of a piece of certified mail notice laid on her step.
Much clothing and some bedding will be sold at the store, while a couple of bigger items such as a crib and a dressing table may be sold online.
"They might as well go to a worthy cause," said Mr. Vanderbeck.
But not everything will wind up with people who may have never met Ms. Giordano or her son. Mr. Vanderbeck decided a while back that he would set aside some mementos in case Michael should ever come looking for them.
So, sitting in a small cardboard box Wednesday were, among other things, a couple of rattles, a small denim baseball cap, tiny mittens, a pair of women’s earrings and Ms. Giordano’s reading glasses.
"We don’t know what the future may hold for Michael but what we do know is that in his first year he was a loved and happy child," said Mr. Vanderbeck. "This is evidence of that."
This also includes many photographs of the baby, most from last Christmastime. And while his face was temporarily scarred by a nasty rash, the youngster seemed to have a huge smile in every photo.
"This was a happy little kid," said Mr. Vanderbeck.
Kelly Bachman of Delaware’s Division of Family Services reported this week that Michael who has now been ruled abandoned and dependent, the first step toward making him available for adoption "is adjusting well to the family he’s living with."
She added something that wouldn’t surprise Mr. Vanderbeck.
"He seems to be very happy," she said.
Mr. Vanderbeck acknowledges that he’s lost some sleep over the last seven weeks thinking about Michael and his mother. Part of that, he said, is because the little boy, whose mother said he didn’t take to too many men, really seemed to like his first landlord.
"It was almost like the baby would look at me and say, ‘Remember this face,’" he said.
Mr. Vanderbeck added, "You try to manipulate all the pieces and come up with something that makes sense and hope that it comes out with a happy ending."
He said this with no signs of hope on his face or in his voice. But that changed Thursday with word that Ms. Giordano’s married boyfriend Rosario "Roy" Digirolamo, 32, of Millstone, the man who paid the rent had returned from Italy and turned himself in to Delaware State Police to face charges of abandoning his son.
"Wow. That’s amazing," said Mr. Vanderbeck. "At least there’s unanswered questions that might have a possibility of being answered. We’re still concerned with Amy’s whereabouts, and hopefully Roy’s return will help answer some questions."
Mr. Vanderbeck recalled Mr. Digirolamo as "humorless."
"Our’s was a business relationship," he said. "The odd thing was that his relationship to her seemed to be the same."
Amanda Porter of Greater Goods commended Mr. Vanderbeck for his generosity and for being so concerned with the mother and child who he knew for only about a year.
"Mike has probably been most sensitive and the strongest advocate for Michael," she said. "He’s a very caring person. He’s handled it with a lot of grace and dignity."
But that didn’t make it any easier for Ms. Porter, a mother herself, to pack up the apartment.
"It’s very clear she was packing up to move into new home," she said in a reference to the fact that many clothes were already in boxes. "Being there was very difficult. It’s obvious that two lives were in progress."
Mr. Vanderbeck hasn’t placed an advertisement for the apartment yet because there’s more than $2,000 worth of repairs that need to be made following law enforcement’s search of the apartment, which included ripping out drains. The forensics report on the apartment was still not complete this week, according to Casey DeBlasio of the Mercer County prosecutor’s office.
Another representative of that office indicated that would be complete three or four weeks ago, and Mr. Vanderbeck tried to hide his frustration over that with a joke.
"On ‘CSI’ I get those results by the next commercial," he said.
Ms. Porter expressed frustration too.
"There’s a growing feeling, ‘Is this it? Is nobody going to try?’" she said. "This is not OK with people. There’s a growing feeling that, as a town that we should be doing something to help, passing the word, spreading it by e-mail."
"It’s heartbreaking since she was so isolated," she continued. "There’s no one out there fighting for her, and Mike has been the closest thing to family for her."
Stephen Fishbaum, a cousin of Ms. Giordano through her adoption by parents who have been estranged from her, has said in recent weeks that he’s considering offering a reward for information in the case. But, as of Thursday, he hadn’t decided, especially with word that Mr. Digirolamo was stateside.
"I wouldn’t want to give the reward to him," he said.
Ms. Porter said she took a picture of the apartment while she was packing up.
"If it were my son, I would have wanted him to see these things," she said.
Mike Vanderbeck doesn’t need to take any photos.
He’s got a box and a mind full of memories.

