Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2009

Infant found underneath truck seat, returned to mother

CONWAY -- A Conway woman's 2-week-old son was safely returned to her arms Tuesday, nearly an hour after she pleaded for the baby's return during a news conference.

Criche Nelson's tears of pain turned to tears of joy after her son, Sharawn Jarod Chestnut Jr., was found unharmed Tuesday afternoon and returned to her.

Police had one person in custody and were questioning another Tuesday evening in connection with the child's disappearance. Nelson's family members said they believe the child was taken by a woman who tried to claim him as her own.

What turned out to be a nightmare for Nelson began around midnight Monday when she went to check on her 1-year-old daughter and 2-week-old son and discovered Sharawn was missing.

She had put the children to bed around 11 p.m. Monday, she told police.

Conway police officers were called to the home on Duckett Street on Tuesday, shortly after midnight, about the missing infant, said Catina Hipp, the police department's public information officer.

Officers searched the area and were unable to locate the child, Hipp said. About 12 hours later police alerted media and held a news conference at 3 p.m. at the Conway City Hall, asking for anyone who had information about the infant to please contact the police department.

Around 3:50 p.m., on Duckett Street at the Darden Terrace Apartments where some neighbors waited outside their homes wondering what happened to the baby, news circulated that Sharawn was found.

Family members said they later learned that a friend of the family took the child.

Police have released no further details about the incident and withheld the name of the person in custody because no charges had been filed Tuesday.

Tiya Gibbons, Nelson's cousin, said she had heard in the neighborhood that a family friend took the baby.

"She was acting too calm when someone told her my cousin's baby was missing," Gibbons, 20, said. "I never thought she would do anything like this."

The woman, according to Gibbons, went to a neighbor's home with the baby, pretending she was the baby's mother.

The neighbor became suspicious and took a picture of the baby on her cell phone, which the neighbor showed to Gibbons after she went to the neighbor's house, Gibbons said.

Gibbons said she knew the woman didn't have a baby, so she ran to another neighbor's house and had that neighbor call the police.

Trying to get police to catch the woman before she got away, Gibbons said she ran and found officers in the neighborhood and gave them the woman's license plate number.

Cassandra Hickman Strothers, also Nelson's cousin, and Bernadette Baker, Nelson's aunt, were on Mill Pond Road and U.S. 501 when police pulled over a truck with a woman and man inside. Strothers said she watched as officers found the baby in a bag under the seat of the truck. She said the child was in a green duffle bag and trash bag under the seat.

Family members believe the friend was pretending to be pregnant and planned to pass the baby off as hers.

"I am overwhelmed," Strothers said as she and dozens of family members, neighbors and friends gathered in the pouring rain outside the home on Duckett Street after Nelson arrived with her son.

Nelson stood on the porch holding and kissing her son who was wrapped up in a blue blanket, happy to see he was OK.

"I'm glad we got him back," Baker said. "There's nothing wrong with him. I stripped him [to check] when we got back."