Police rescue one month old baby from woman desperately seeking child ...photo

Police in Akwa Ibom State, yesterday, said it had recovered a one-month-old stolen baby girl from a 30-year-old woman, identified as Peace Chukwuemeka. The police added that it also rescued a four-year-old boy from a young man, who had snatched him from his mother at gunpoint.

The Commissioner of Police, Mr. Murtala Mani, who disclosed this to newsmen yesterday at the Police Headquarters, Ikot-Akpan Abia, said Peace Chukwuemeka was arrested by officers of its Family Unit following useful information.

Mani said Chukwuemeka lives in the same compound with the parents of the baby girl at Mbak Itam in Itu Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State. According to him, “rescuing the one-month-old baby and bringing her back to the mother is a great achievement. The suspect, who has been married for some years now without a baby, left Lagos State for Uyo.

“Intelligence reports reveal that she has been staying in the same compound with parents of the baby in Mbak Itam with the intention to steal the baby-girl by drugging the mother.

“Unfortunately for her, the Family Unit of the command, through intelligence reports, was able to rescue the baby and give her back to the mother.”

Peace Chukwuemeka, who confessed to the crime, denied drugging the mother before stealing the baby. She linked her action to desperation due to her inability to bear children after 10 years of marriage. She said: “I did not drug her mother; it was coincidental that she was asleep and I seized that opportunity to take away the baby. I have been married for 10 years now, so I was desperately in need of having a baby.”

Asked where she was arrested with the baby, she said: “I took the baby to my mother in the village, but she (my mother) refused to collect her from me.

“So I came back to Akwa Ibom and the owner of the baby started asking me of her baby. That was how I was arrested by the police.”