Rhon­dor Dowlat-Ros­tant

Po­lice of­fi­cers from the Cen­tral Di­vi­sion and An­ti-Kid­nap­ping Squad have res­cued ba­by Sofia Ri­vas in Curepe.

Ac­cord­ing to po­lice re­ports, af­ter re­ceiv­ing in­tel­li­gence, of­fi­cers went to an apart­ment at Mc In­roy Street in Curepe just af­ter 11 pm, where they re­cov­ered the nine-month-old ba­by girl, who had been ab­duct­ed from her moth­er Valenti­na Her­nan­dez ear­li­er on Tues­day.

Ba­by Sofia was still in the hands of the woman who had re­port­ed­ly ab­duct­ed her ear­li­er.

Ba­by Sofia was said to be in good health but was tak­en to the near­by Er­ic Williams Med­ical Sci­ences Com­plex for a med­ical check be­fore be­ing tak­en to her moth­er.

The woman was ar­rest­ed and is now as­sist­ing of­fi­cers with their in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

Ear­li­er in the day, of­fi­cers had been search­ing for an East In­di­an woman and the dri­ver of a sil­ver-grey sta­tion wag­on, whom they said could have as­sist­ed in the al­leged ab­duc­tion of the child.

Sofia’s moth­er, Valenti­na Her­nan­dez, who is a Venezue­lan na­tion­al, had her worst night­mare on Tues­day, when her ba­by was tak­en from her by a woman who ap­proached her un­der the pre­tense that she was “tak­ing her (Sofia) for a walk to the su­per­mar­ket to pur­chase a juice for her.”

How­ev­er, while the woman did go to the su­per­mar­ket, which is on the same prop­er­ty as the apart­ment com­plex in which Her­nan­dez lives, she soon got in­to the ve­hi­cle with the ba­by and was nev­er seen again.

The dis­traught moth­er told po­lice that at about 7.30 am, she was at the apart­ment com­plex at Pokhor Road, Long­denville, Cha­gaua­nas, when she was ap­proached by the woman, whom she knew as a ten­ant from the said build­ing.

Po­lice said af­ter con­vers­ing with the moth­er, the woman asked her if she could car­ry the ba­by with her for a walk to the near­by 6to9 Con­ve­nience Store and Ice Cream shop, which is lo­cat­ed in an an­nex of the three-storey apart­ment build­ing.

How­ev­er, Her­nan­dez said she found it strange when the woman did not re­turn with her child and she got wor­ried. Af­ter three hours there was still no sign of her child and the woman made her way to the Long­denville Po­lice Post where she re­port­ed her ba­by miss­ing.

Po­lice of­fi­cers who re­spond­ed went to the su­per­mar­ket where they re­cov­ered CCTV footage which showed the ba­by in the woman’s arms as she walked through the var­i­ous aisles of the es­tab­lish­ment. The footage al­so showed the woman leav­ing with the ba­by girl and en­ter­ing a Nis­san AD sta­tion wag­on, li­censed PCU 6452, which was parked a few me­ters away from the su­per­mar­ket. The dri­ver, a man, then drove off with the woman and child. It is be­lieved the man works “PH” along the Long­denville to Ch­agua­nas route.

The of­fi­cers lat­er spoke to sev­er­al ten­ants from the apart­ment com­plex as part of their in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

Speak­ing with the Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day evening, a male rel­a­tive of Her­nan­dez said the fam­i­ly came from Venezuela seek­ing a “bet­ter life” and now their fu­ture plans had been ru­ined with Sofia’s ab­duc­tion. He, how­ev­er, said they strong­ly be­lieve they will get back ba­by Sofia.

“This is very bad. You can’t trust no­body but we will get back the ba­by. We are very sad,” the male rel­a­tive, who did not want to be named, said.

A work­er in the con­ve­nience store, who was on du­ty when the woman en­tered with the child, said he did not find any­thing strange and was shocked to hear from the moth­er that the ba­by had been ab­duct­ed.

“Ap­par­ent­ly, the woman was stay­ing at an apart­ment with some­one for a week or just a few days. We didn’t re­al­ly know her but she didn’t act strange. She did not even pur­chase any­thing. She just left af­ter walk­ing around a bit,” the work­er, who al­so did not want to be named, said.

Asked if the ve­hi­cle the woman en­tered was known in the area, the work­er replied, “No, we don’t know.”

The own­er of the store and apart­ment build­ing was on the com­pound dur­ing Guardian’s Me­dia’s vis­it but re­fused to com­ment about the sit­u­a­tion.

Po­lice sources said pre­lim­i­nary in­ves­ti­ga­tions have re­vealed that the woman who took the child lives in the same apart­ment com­plex as Her­nan­dez.

“From what we are be­ing told, it’s that the moth­er knew the woman as they are from the same build­ing and she was ac­cus­tomed to talk­ing to her (the moth­er) in the past few days. The moth­er said she didn’t ex­pect the woman to take her ba­by but we have sev­er­al leads and we are hope­ful to find the woman and the ba­by safe and sound,” the po­lice source said.

A res­i­dent from the area, who wished not to dis­close his name, said he was in shock to hear what took place.

“I saw the po­lice there as I was leav­ing home to go to work and I re­al­ly saw it all over Face­book and I re­alised that it hap­pened right here. It now click to me but it al­ways have peo­ple in that yard so this is re­al shock­ing and sad.”

Any­one with in­for­ma­tion on the woman and ba­by’s where­abouts is asked to call the po­lice at 999, 555, 800-TIPS, 482-GARY or the Ch­agua­nas Po­lice Sta­tion at 665-5271.