Service tomorrow for baby Aaron

Police chaplain Trevor Harrison will today plan the funeral of a baby born 10 weeks early and found dead in a Hastings drain.

The boy, whom police have named Aaron, was found in Cobham Place on January 24.

He will be buried tomorrow next to Moses, a dead baby found in a Hastings garden on January 4.

Mr Harrison, who also buried Moses, said it was always difficult to conduct services for young children, and these two funerals were no exception.

"People are always grieving," he said. "It's a very tricky, painful situation."

Whatever the circumstances of the child's death, the parents would be feeling a lot of pain for the potential lost when their baby died.

The mother, he said, "may have lived with a secret for six months" and would still be hurting.

Aaron's funeral will be held in the Hastings cemetery at 3pm tomorrow. His mother has not been found.

Detective Senior Sergeant Sam Aberahama said police had sent DNA samples from 15 women for analysis in connection with the inquiry. The results were expected in about two weeks.

An additional 15 samples were yet to be collected.

DNA swabs were also being taken from Hastings women of the same ethnicity - Maori or Pacific Islander - as baby Moses to check whether any could be his mother.