Baby-snatching: 2 appear in court

A YOUNG mother told the high court in Pretoria of her anguish when her baby was snatched from her back while she was walking in a Brakpan street on her way to church.

The mother, who cannot be named to protect the child, was testifying in the trial of Kingsley Nnadi, 33, and Thapelo Mthapo (no age given), who are facing an array of charges following the alleged baby-snatching in January 2014.

She saw a man following her that morning. She then noticed a car moving across the road to her side. A man grabbed her and she fell to the ground. He tried to carry her to the car but she refused to budge. He then grabbed the baby.

“They sped off in a car with my baby. I screamed: ‘My baby! My baby! They stole my baby!’. I thought I would never see her again.”

About a month later, police phoned her to say they had found her baby.

“She was a big baby, but she had lost weight by then. I had breast-fed her before, but she no longer wanted my breast.”

Nnadi’s girlfriend, Jabulile Masombuka, 23, has pleaded guilty to snatching the baby and later hiding 10 packs of drugs in the child’s nappy. She received a 10-year sentence and agreed to testify against her boyfriend and his friend, who pleaded not guilty.

Masombuka has told Judge Eben Jordaan that she used to work as a drug runner for her boyfriend because she needed money. Her boyfriend had often assaulted her as she could not bear him a child.

She said her boyfriend told her they had to steal a baby and he made the arrangements with two of his friends. The police found the snatched baby in the couple’s flat by chance during a drug raid.

Her boyfriend denied any knowledge of the baby snatching. The trial continues.