Abducted Infant Found in New Mexico

Abducted Infant Found in New Mexico
By BETSY BLANEY
AP

LUBBOCK, Texas (March 11) -- A newborn kidnapped from a hospital here was found safe in a New Mexico hospital on Sunday, police said.
Four-day-old Mychael Darthard-Dawodu was in good condition in Clovis, N.M., and transportation was being arranged to return the baby to Texas, said Lubbock police Lt. Scott Hudgens.

"We're ecstatic to be able to locate the child still in good health and to be able to reunite her with her mother," Hudgens said Sunday morning.

The infant was kidnapped early Saturday by a woman posing as a medical worker, who walked out of Covenant Lakeside Hospital with the 5-pound baby hidden in her purse, police said.

The FBI was interviewing a suspect, said Covenant Health System Vice President Gwen Stafford.

The baby's parents were notified of the recovery, Stafford said.

"Certainly they are relieved and happy and the next chapter is to have the mother hold the baby in her arms," Stafford said Sunday morning.

The abduction sparked a manhunt and multiple Amber Alerts in Texas and New Mexico. Tips about the abduction came in from across the country, Hudgens said.

Lubbock police had contacted authorities in Clovis after receiving a tip that a person matching the woman's description was seen in that city about 100 miles northwest of Lubbock.

Hospital surveillance footage showed a woman wearing blue and flower-print hospital scrubs and a gray, puffy jacket with a hood walking out of the hospital around 1:20 a.m. Saturday. She fled in a red pickup truck, possibly with a male accomplice, police said.

The abductor had gone into Mychael's mother's room several times before the baby was taken, telling her the baby needed tests, Stafford said.

Stafford said she did not know why the kidnapper took the baby to the Clovis hospital. The child was suffering from jaundice, a common complication in newborns in which a buildup of pigment in the blood causes a yellowing of the skin.