Jeffrey Hunsberger and his wife, Michelle Legere, of Eden Mills, Vt., say they heard no warnings about having a safe sleep environment before their son, Simon, died in bed with them in August 2005. They're shown here with daughter Sophie, born in November 2006. In Simon's memory, they've set up a foundation both to aid other grieving parents and to promote safe sleeping practices. (SHNS photo courtesy Jeffrey Hunsberger)

James McKenna, an anthropologist at the University of Notre Dame, lectures at a recent meeting of the American Anthropological Association. After nearly three decades studying how babies and mothers sleep together, McKenna says he doesn't advocate bed-sharing for all families, but strongly objects to efforts by public health officials to stigmatize or criminalize the practice. "It's ethically wrong ... to take the decision out of the hands of parents," he says. (SHNS photo by Lee Bowman.)

This graphic describes federally recommended procedures to keep babies safe when put to bed. (SHNS graphic by Chris Campbell)

Dr. Rachel Moon, a pediatrician at Children's National Medical Center and George Washington University who studies infant sleep risks and bed-sharing, shown here in a sleep lab at the hospital, says there are clear links between sudden infant deaths and sharing a bed. She's helping to lead a new research project to study if crib distributions and safe sleep education bring down unexplained baby deaths. (SHNS photo courtesy Children's National Medical Center)

Pittsburgh-based Cribs for Kids was founded in 1998 after the local child death review team noted that most sudden infant deaths were happening in unsafe sleep settings. The program has distributed 6,500 cribs, and has established 152 branches in 33 states in just the past 18 months. From left, around the demonstration crib at the office of Sudden Infant Death Services of Pennsylvania, are Eileen Collins, director of support and education, Judith Bannon, executive director and founder of the project, and Barbara Clemmons, crib distribution manager.

Coroners in 11 counties have discovered that, about three-quarters of the time, sudden infant deaths are actually avoidable accidental smotherings when adults co-sleep with their babies or place infants in overstuffed sofas and heavily blanketed beds. (SHNS graphic by Chris Campbell)

Graphic shows how Child Death Review programs increase the detection rates for infant homicides and accidental suffocations. (SHNS graphic by Chris Campbell)

Sometimes infant homicides are obvious, even though they frequently go unsolved. The body of a newborn infant girl was found April 5, 2006, inside a plastic garbage bag in Kitsap County, Wash. Authorities, who are still searching for the mother, named the child Dawn. "She saw the dawn of her life and little more," said Kitsap County Coroner Greg Sandstrom. A year later, Dawn was buried in a donated plot in Port Orchard, Wash. (SHNS photo by Lenna Himmelstein / The Kitsap Sun)

Linda Norton, a nationally prominent forensic pathologist from Dallas, said it is easy for infant homicides to be mistaken for Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Homicides are especially likely to be overlooked when coroners with little or no medical training get little or no supervision from child death review teams. "I often tell people that if you want to commit murder and get away with it, come see me," Norton said. "I know the best places to go." (SHNS photo courtesy Linda Norton)

Linda Norton, a forensic pathologist from Dallas, said it is easy for infant homicides to be mistaken for Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. (SHNS photo courtesy Linda Norton)