A South African woman who kidnapped a 3
day old newborn baby girl while she was
sleeping beside her mother in a hospital in
Cape Town in April 1997 and raised the girl
as her own, was sentenced to 10 years in jail
on Monday for kidnapping.
The presiding Judge, Judge John Hlophe in
Cape Town announced the sentence, telling
the 52-year-old convicted kidnapper that she
had caused "immense" pain to the kidnapped
girl's biological parents, the African News
Agency reported.
The young woman who was kidnapped as a
baby is known as Zephany Nurse, but that's
not her real name, that name is the one given
to her by her biological parents and used in
the media in the years since her
disappearance.
But since she has been found by her parents,
she has chosen to continue using the name
given to her by the kidnapper.
So in order to protect her privacy, a judge
ordered that her adopted name and the name
of her kidnapper should not be used by the
media.
Zephany Nurse was reunited last year with
her biological parents, Morne and Celeste
Nurse, after the couple's second daughter
befriended a girl at school who looked so
much like her. The couple's second daughter
was baffled by the similarities and told her
parents about it. When her parents saw
Zephany Nurse, they immediately suspected
that she could be their long lost daughter, so
they got the police involved.
A police investigation and DNA tests showed
that the two girls were sisters and confirmed
that the new friend was the Nurse's missing
child.
During the court case, the kidnapper still
maintained that she didn't kidnap the little
girl in 1997 which annoyed the judge during
sentencing.
Judge Hlophe criticized the kidnapper for
sticking to her story that she had bought the
baby from a woman who told her that the
biological parents did not want the child.
Hlophe said:
"At the very least, one would expect
you to apologize, but you chose not
to."
The family of the convicted kidnapper blew
kisses to her as she was led to a holding cell
after the sentencing, and there was an
alleged confrontation between the
kidnapper's family and Zephany Nurse's
biological family outside the courthouse.
Chantall Berry, Zephany Nurse's aunt
allegedly said:
"She belongs to us." "She has our
DNA. Her DNA will never change."
Zephany Nurse's biological parents were in
court for the sentencing Monday, but their
daughter was not. Zephany Nurse has not
been allowed to have any contact with the
convicted kidnapper but has been living with
the kidnapper's husband, who she thought
was her biological father.
The prosecution said the woman defrauded
authorities when she registered Zephany
Nurse as her own daughter in 2003 under a
false birthdate.
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