A woman who snatched a newborn from a hospital more than two decades ago and raised the child as her own was sentenced Monday to 12 years in prison.
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According to the Associated Press, Ann Pettway, 50, of Raleigh, N.C., nodded her head repeatedly as U.S. District Judge Kevin P. Castel announced his sentence in a Manhattan courtroom, as the true parents of Carlina White, who was stolen from Harlem Hospital when she was only 19 days old, looked on.
Pettway had pleaded guilty to kidnapping in February, describing how she took a train from her Connecticut home to the hospital, where she posed as a nurse and took Carlina White in 1987.
The sentence was far less than the 20 years in prison recommended by prosecutors and the Probation Department, but it was within the 10 to 12 and a half years agreed to by prosecutors and defense lawyers when a plea agreement was signed.
Castel scolded Pettway, telling her she had “inflicted a parents’ worst nightmare on a young couple,” caused other parents to fear child kidnappings and led hospitals to install preventive measures to avoid similar kidnappings.
Pettway’s actions are the most selfish and horrific thing you could do to a parent.
