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March 11, 2016

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Woman who took baby girl convicted

A South African woman was yesterday convicted of kidnapping a newborn baby and raising her for 17 years before an astonishing coincidence reunited the girl with her biological family.

“You must have been the person who removed the child from hospital,” High Court judge John Hlophe told the woman who claimed to have been handed the baby at a Cape Town train station in 1997.

“Your story, if anything is a fairy tale and the court rejects it with the contempt it deserves.”

The 50-year-old accused, who cannot be named to protect the new identity of the kidnapped girl, remained grim-faced.

The girl’s biological mother. Celeste Nurse, 36, sobbed loudly as the guilty verdict was handed down.

The accused was ordered to return to court for sentencing on May 30.

The girl’s real identity came to light in February last year, when her younger biological sister began attending high school in Cape Town and pupils pointed out her remarkable likeness to a final-year student.

The younger girl told her parents, who met the older girl and immediately believed she was their long-lost baby.

They called the police, and DNA tests confirmed that the girl was indeed their child, whom they had named Zephany Joy Nurse.


 

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