New Mother's Nightmare - Baby kidnapped by fake nurse

[southerngale]

Omgosh, this poor woman. I can't even imagine!! It's kinda hard to believe that nobody would check out someone who kept visiting in scrubs and no ID badge. My only comfort is that the baby will likely not be harmed since the woman who stole her probably just wants a baby. Let's just pray they find the baby and return her to her mother. Hopefully the abductor will seek medical attention for the baby's jaundice and get caught that way.

LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) _ The woman accused of abducting a newborn girl apparently blended in with hospital staff in the days before the child's disappearance.

Nurses on duty at the time the woman visited the newborn, Priscilla Nicole Maldonado, and her family remembered seeing her on repeated visits to the hospital, police said.

But no one asked why she wasn't wearing the correct color of hospital scrubs or why she didn't have an identification badge, officials said. Nurses from doctors' offices and other medical facilities often wear scrubs to work and sometimes come to visit newborns and their families, Lubbock police Lt. Roy Bassett said.

"From what I understand, they don't check and identify every possible visitor who comes to the hospital," he said. "She didn't make any attempt to take the baby from the hospital and didn't spark any suspicions."

Police were still searching Monday for the infant and the suspected abductor, who befriended the mother, Erica Ysasaga, while she was in the hospital and later stole the baby from her home. Priscilla has jaundice, and blood tests before her abduction showed her condition worsening, University Medical Center spokesman Greg Bruce said.

"Time is paramount," Bassett said, adding that police were following up on a "significant number" of calls Monday.

"We're obviously still canvassing the neighborhood and talking to everyone we possibly can," Bassett said.

In the hospital, the suspected kidnapper led Ysasaga led the mother to believe she was a nurse by dressing like one, asking questions about the baby and sometimes retrieving towels, the family said. When Ysasaga was discharged, the woman asked for her address, saying she had a swing and some clothes for the baby.

"She was concerned all the time about my baby so I thought she was a nurse," Ysasaga told KAMC-TV.

On Sunday, the woman visited the family's home and told the mother she wanted to put the newborn in a baby pageant.

"I said, 'No, my baby is sick. She can't be out in public,"' Ysasaga said. "She said they would pay me $100 and my baby would win stuff."

The woman then said she had relatives on the next block and wanted to show them the baby. Ysasaga said she would go with her, but the woman disappeared with the newborn while Ysasaga was momentarily distracted.

"My son ran ahead of me so I tried to reach over and grab him and when I did that, I turned around. Just like that, my baby was gone," she said.

In trying to gain Ysasaga's confidence, the woman gave Ysasaga a driver's license number and Social Security number "so that you have some confidence that you know who I am," Bassett said the woman told Ysasaga. Bassett said neither number matched with the name the woman had given the mother.

Ysasaga told police she saw two vehicles _ a red Pontiac four-door car and a white van _ leaving the area but did not see the woman or the baby in one of them, Bassett said.

Authorities don't believe the woman was a hospital employee based on the color of her scrubs and the fact that she was not wearing a name tag.

"To the best of our knowledge, it's not an employee of our hospital," Bruce said. "The description of what the employee was wearing, how the employee was acting while they visited with the mother in the hospital is not consistent with any of our staff."

Police on Monday were checking surveillance video from the hospital to try to identify the woman.

Bassett said police believed the abduction was planned over a number of days.

"I think that at the very least she has some local ties," he said.

http://www.kfdm.com/engine.pl?station=k ... local.html

[Janice]

Scary, huh?

[SouthFloridawx]

[Miss Mary]

What a truly horrifying kidnapping. I am praying for this baby right now. I think we had an Amber Alert go up for this baby girl:

http://www.storm2k.org/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=85214

[GalvestonDuck]

They let someone without the obvious hospital attire or ID INTO the nursery in the first place?

Somebody's gonna have a lot of explaining to do.

Here at UTMB, only those with a particular emblem on their ID badge are allowed to take a baby or child from the nursery or from their parents/nurse's care. You'd be surprised how many subtle identifiers there are for staff, as well as for certain patients (suicidal, fall risk, recent miscarriage). Obviously, some things can't be spelled out because of patient confidentiality. But at UK, for example, they would hang a picture of a teddy bear on the door of a woman who just lost her baby. Obviously, she might still be on the post-partum ward if it was recent and they didn't want phlebotomists, X-ray techs, EKG techs, and so on to assume that just because she was post-partum, there was a baby. All too often, friendly people would mistakenly ask how the newborn was doing, only to end up with a foot in their mouth.

Okay, I got sidetracked....

Still think it's a shame that a non-employee managed to be there, much less be able to remove a baby without any questions.

[southerngale]

You're right, Miss Mary. I hadn't seen that and I guess Lubbock is too far away that it didn't go off on my NOAA Weather Alert.

THE LUBBOCK POLICE DEPARTMENT IS SEARCHING FOR PRICILLA NICOLE MALDONADO.
...DATE OF BIRTH...MAY 31...2006...18 1/4 INCHES...5.5 POUNDS...WHITE.
...FEMALE...BLACK HAIR...BROWN EYES...AND WEARING A DIAPER...WHITE
SOCKS...WRAPPED IN A BLUE RECEIVING BLANKET.

[Miss Mary]

Missing baby has been found. She's been taken to the hospital. No word on her condition or any other details (arrests, etc.).

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/06/05/missin ... index.html

I pray she's going to be okay.

Edit - more info in this article.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,198301,00.html

[tomboudreau]

Great news...baby has been found.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/06/05/missing.baby.ap/index.html

[O Town]

So glad she has been found. I know here at my local hospitals in the Labor and Delivery it is very strict on the rules, and at Arnold Palmer you have to show ID and get a badge just to visit. I feel sorry for what the mother must have been feeling for those hours after her baby was taken. At any rate I am happy to hear the baby has been found and is okay.

[MScoast]

at my hospital, labor and delivery, post partum, and pediatrics is in a lock down unit. nobody allowed in unless they have a badge with a scanning key. L&D nurses and pediatric nurses all have pink badges where all other nurses have green. We are NOT allowed to come on shift unless badges are worn. Sounds like this hospital needs some "updating" as far as security issues go!! Thank goodness this baby has been found...

[george_r_1961]

at my hospital, labor and delivery, post partum, and pediatrics is in a lock down unit. nobody allowed in unless they have a badge with a scanning key. L&D nurses and pediatric nurses all have pink badges where all other nurses have green. We are NOT allowed to come on shift unless badges are worn. Sounds like this hospital needs some "updating" as far as security issues go!! Thank goodness this baby has been found...

I never thought id see the day when it would come to this. World is getting too crazy.

[GalvestonDuck]

Yay! Baby found!

*smacks self in forehead* "Read slower, Duckie." She didn't take the baby from the hospital...waited until after mom and baby left.

[southerngale]

Thank God the baby has been found!

[TexasStooge]

Thank God the baby has been found!

I second that.

What I don't understand is why that deranged woman (posing as fake nurse) had to kidnap the baby?

[O Town]

Yay! Baby found!

*smacks self in forehead* "Read slower, Duckie." She didn't take the baby from the hospital...waited until after mom and baby left.

*Double smack* I thought the same thing. Must have been your reply that threw me off. lol.

[Janice]

After a tip called in to police, Priscilla Nicole Maldonado was found unattended, lying in a car seat in a carport at a Lubbock condominium complex. Temperatures at the time were in the low 100s.


http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/06/06/missin ... index.html

[TexasStooge]

After a tip called in to police, Priscilla Nicole Maldonado was found unattended, lying in a car seat in a carport at a Lubbock condominium complex. Temperatures at the time were in the low 100s.


http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/06/06/missin ... index.html

What was Stephanie Lynn Anderson Jones trying to do to Priscilla, kill her?

[Miss Mary]

OMG - and here I thought the kidnapper was a woman who tragically, possibly lost a baby of her own. I kept hoping the baby was being well cared for, if illegally. Not dumped in a hot car, waiting to suffocate. I hope this woman never sees the outside of prison walls again.

What a relief this baby was found. Praise God this was a happy ending!

Mary

[Janice]

The mother was on CNN this morning and said the baby is doing really good. No major problems as a result of the abduction.

[Dr. Jonah Rainwater]

I'm guessing the tip to the police was called in by the kidnapper after she heard the media reports of the baby's illness...sounds like the conscientous thing to do, but in a HOT CAR?

Keep us updated on the search for the woman who did this. She needs to be locked up.