Report: Woman Poses as Social Worker and Attempts to Kidnap Newborn

A woman posed as a social worker and tried to kidnap a newborn from his home in California, according to ABC11. The woman claimed to be named Mayella Ortega and told the new mom she was there to take her one-week-old child into protective custody.

The woman reportedly didn’t show any identification, and luckily the new mom picked up on the shady situation. After the mother questioned the stranger, the poser said she’d return with the sheriff’s department and would forcibly remove her baby. Not backing down, ABC11 quotes the mom saying, “if the sheriff has to come in, that’s fine. But I don’t want to give you my kid.”

The mom and her sisters were able to record a video on one of their phones of the woman as she was walking away. Social services said no one by the woman’s name works for the agency, and there were no records associated with the newborn’s home.

Eventually, the woman turned herself into police, and was positively identified by the baby’s mother. The mother claims the woman told police while it’s her in the video, she wasn’t there to take the child. The investigation is currently ongoing, and the woman is being interviewed by homicide detectives to learn what she was doing at the home and how she knew personal information about the mom and her newborn.

The scary close call is a reminder to parents to always keep their guard up. Last year, a woman used Facebook to get information about a family, and posed as an employee from Child Protective Services in an attempt to kidnap their infant.

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