More than two decades ago, a newborn sick with fever was snatched from a New York City hospital, her frantic mother returning to the emergency room to find an empty crib. Police said the baby - now a woman - has been found.
It was a remarkable reunion after Carlina White tracked down the mother she was stolen from 23 years ago when the then-19-day-old was taken from Harlem Hospital.
Now, Joy White and Carlina are back together again.
Joy was 16 years old when she and her husband, Carl Tyson, took their daughter to the hospital on Aug. 4, 1987. Two hours later, they were devastated to learn that their baby was gone, lifted out of the pediatrics ward.
Carlina is now 23 and was raised as Nejdra Nance in Bridgeport, Connecticut and Georgia, while her real mother lived with her grief in the Bronx.
As a teenager, Carlina came to believe she was not related to the family that was raising her. She began to check missing children websites, and she eventually found her own case.
She called the website for help, and they called Joy, the mother who had kept her baby's picture on display all these years.
"She said she just had a feeling, she felt different from the people raising her," said Nance's maternal grandmother, Elizabeth White, 71. "She searched, and then she found Joy."
DNA testing proved Carlina was the stolen child.
Criminal charges for the abduction are possible, as there's no statute of limitations. Meanwhile, after decades apart, the reunion has gone well.
Well at least the story had a happy ending.
-AL
