Operatives of the Benue State Police Command have arrested several suspects linked to the brazen theft of a newborn baby from a hospital in Gboko, and the infant has since been recovered unharmed, barely two days after the incident sent shockwaves through the community.
The command’s spokesperson, Peter Aondongu, confirmed the arrests in a telephone interview on Thursday, offering the clearest official account yet of a case that had, by midweek, drawn crowds of anxious relatives and residents to the hospital gates.
“I can confirm to you that some suspects have been arrested in connection with the theft of a newborn baby in Gboko on Tuesday,” Aondongu told reporters, adding that the operation to track down those responsible moved swiftly once the alarm was raised.
According to the police spokesman, the investigation has already fanned out beyond Gboko itself. “Some of the suspects were earlier transferred to the state headquarters in Makurdi, while other suspects are in police custody at Gboko division right now,” he said, signalling that detectives in the state capital are now involved in piecing together how the abduction was planned and executed.
The theft is said to have occurred on Tuesday, just hours after the baby boy was delivered at the hospital. Sources close to the family say the infant did not cry immediately after birth, a tense moment that briefly alarmed the delivery room before medical staff intervened and the baby began responding normally. Relieved, staff then moved mother and child to a recovery ward.
It was there, according to an eyewitness who spoke to journalists on condition of anonymity, that the plot unfolded. The witness alleged that a woman posing as a hospital nurse had been trailing the new mother from the moment of delivery, waiting for an opportunity to strike.
Shortly after the pair settled into the ward, the woman approached and asked to examine the baby once more, a request that, coming from someone the mother believed to be hospital staff, raised no immediate suspicion. The exhausted mother handed her newborn over without hesitation.
The impostor then carried the baby in the direction of the labor room. When the baby’s grandmother, who had been keeping watch nearby, moved to follow, she was told to stand back and assured that all was well. Trusting the reassurance, she stepped aside.
Immediately after the baby was born, the infant did not cry as expected. The nurse on duty reportedly intervened, and the newborn eventually responded normally,” the eyewitness recounted. Thereafter, both the mother and the baby were taken to a ward. Not long after, an alleged child trafficker approached the mother of the newborn under the pretense of being one of the nurses.
The suspect claimed they wanted to check the baby once again. The trafficker then took the baby from the mother and headed toward the labour room.
Sensing something amiss, the mother-in-law who had been with her daughter-in-law followed and stood at the labour room’s entrance, but she was instructed to step back, with assurances that everything would be fine, so she complied. Shortly afterwards, the strange woman disappeared with the newborn baby.
It did not take long for the family to realise something was terribly wrong. When staff went looking for the baby, nurses on duty said no one had taken the infant from the ward on their instructions and, more alarmingly, that the woman who had presented herself as a member of staff was not known to them at all. She was not, in fact, a nurse at the hospital.
News of the missing newborn spread quickly. Family members, sympathizers, and other concerned residents converged on the hospital as word got around, and the gathering crowd created mounting tension in and around the facility.
With emotions running high and the situation threatening to spiral, security operatives were deployed to the hospital to maintain order and prevent any breakdown of law and order while the search for the baby got underway.
Police have not yet released full details of how the baby was traced or the exact circumstances of the recovery, nor have they disclosed the number or identities of those arrested, citing the ongoing nature of the investigation.
It also remains unclear whether the suspects now in custody include the woman accused of posing as a nurse, or whether she was working as part of a wider network.
What is clear, officials say, is that the child is now safe. Aondongu’s confirmation that the baby had been recovered will come as a measure of relief to the family and to a community that had been gripped by fear over the case, one that has also renewed concerns about security and identity verification for hospital staff at health facilities across the state.
The Benue State Police Command says investigations are continuing, with more suspects expected to be arraigned as the case progresses. Authorities have yet to indicate whether the incident will prompt a review of security protocols at maternity wards in the state, a question likely to loom large as the case moves toward prosecution.
WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW
A newborn was stolen from his mother in a Gboko hospital by a woman posing as a nurse, and it worked because no one thought to verify her identity before handing over the baby.
Police have since recovered the child and arrested suspects, but the real takeaway is the warning it leaves behind: hospitals and new parents need stricter verification of staff handling newborns, since trust alone was all it took for the trafficker to walk out with the baby unchallenged.
