Kamiyah Mobley: Baby Kidnapped 18 Years Ago Found Alive, Says Her ‘Mom’ Is Not A ‘Felon’

Kamiyah Mobley, the baby kidnapped from a Florida hospital when she was a newborn in 1998, has been found alive and well in South Carolina. Gloria Williams dressed as a nurse and snatched the baby from her teenage mother’s arms and then raised the child as her own, police say.

Alexis Manigo is the name Kamiyah Mobley grew up thinking belonged to her. She was found living what appeared to be a normal and happy life with the 51-year-woman who had raised her, the Daily Mail reports.

The 18-year-old kidnap victim defended the woman she believed to be her mother in a Facebook post after the shocking arrest of Gloria Williams.

“My mother raised me with everything I needed and most of all everything I wanted,” Kamiyah Mobley posted to her Facebook account under the name of Alexis Manigo.

“My mother is no felon.”

Before Gloria Williams was extradited back to Florida to face kidnapping charges, Alexis Manigo – Kamiyah Mobley was permitted to speak with her through a glass window at the South Carolina jail. The teenager shouted, “I love you mom,” before the two were forced to separate.

Gloria Williams reportedly suffered a miscarriage about one week before she allegedly pretended to be a nurse and took the 8-hour-old baby away from her 16-year-old biological mother, Shanara Mobley. According to a Walterboro Live report, Gloria Williams drove three hours to the Jacksonville Medical Center to kidnap a baby in July of 1998.

Williams allegedly roamed the halls of the Jacksonville hospital for 14 hours the day of the kidnapping. She spent a total of five hours with Shanara Mobley and the baby inside the hospital room before announcing the baby had a fever and took the newborn out of the room, the Florida Times-Union reports. Nurses at the hospital thought Williams was a member of the family.

Vera Aiken, the baby’s paternal grandmother, was the first person to become suspicious after the baby was carried away. She thought it was odd a nurse, Williams was dressed in scrubs, was carrying her purse over her shoulder while on duty.

“I just feel like if I would have reacted on my feelings I could have done something,” Aiken said.

“I could have taken that lady out with my bare hands.”

By the time the grandmother and the rest of the relatives, along with the hospital staff realized something was horribly wrong, it was too late. A lockdown of the Jacksonville hospital yielded no results in the search for the kidnapper or the newborn baby girl. Only grainy surveillance camera footage held an image of the kidnapper and no photos had yet been taken of Kamiyah Mobley.

Craig Aiken has never met his daughter. He was in jail on a drug charge the day she was born, WJXT reports. The 19-year-old Florida man wound up getting an extra five months behind bars due to the kidnapping. The crime led police officers to discover Shanara was only 15 when the baby was conceived, making her below the age of legal consent to have sex with Aiken, an adult.

Shanara Mobley received a $1.5 million settlement from the hospital in 2000 after suing them over the kidnapping of her newborn baby. Shanara went on to have three more children but never reportedly gave up looking for her first born.

In 2008, Shanara said, “I wonder, ‘What does she like? What kind of food? What kind of colors? How smart is she? Does she have long pretty hair? Does she have my eyelashes?”

Kamiyah Mobley recently graduated from high school in South Carolina. She grew up living with Gloria Williams and the 51-year-old woman’s two biological children. If convicted on the kidnapping and custodial interference charges levied against her, Williams could face life in prison.

Just a few hours of realizing she was not really Alexis Manigo, Kamiyah Mobley connected with her birth parents via FaceTime. Both Shanara Mobley and Craig Aiken, reportedly cried “tears of joy” after a Jacksonville, Florida police detective told them their baby girl had been found.

“She doesn’t act like we’re brand new people. She acts like she’s been talking to us a long time,” Vera Aiken, said.

A neighbor to Gloria Williams and the family, Joseph Jenkins, told local reporters Kamiyah Mobley was a good girl who never got into any trouble and was not an abused child. The neighbor added, “But she grew up with a lie for 18 years.”

Law enforcement investigators are still conducting interviews with relatives of Gloria Williams to garner more details about the abduction. Why she chose the Jacksonville, Florida hospital or targeted the baby of Shanara Mobley and Craig Aiken, remains unknown.

Tesha Stephens, a cousin to Williams, told reporters the family had no idea the baby they welcomed home 18 years ago had been kidnapped.

“Right now she’s [Alexis Manigo/Kamiyah Mobley] holding up. She’s processing everything and she’s probably going to have to take this day-by-day. This was something brand new to all of us,” Stephens said.

Police investigators were led to the home of Gloria Williams based upon a tip received by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. The source of the successful tip has not yet been revealed.

When detectives found Alexis Manigo they learned she had the same birth date as Kamiyah Mobley, but a different name. They soon discovered fake documents had been used to create an identity for the baby.

Police detectives took a DNA sample from Alexia Manigo and submitted it to a crime lab for testing. The DNA matched one that had been taken from the newborn baby. Law enforcement authorities said the Mobley was in “good health” and appeared to be a “normal 18-year-old woman.”

Jacksonville Sheriff Mike Williams said the Kamiyah Mobley had an “inclination” several months ago that she might have been involved in the kidnapping that garnered national attention 18 years ago. The Florida sheriff did not share with the media exactly why the woman who had been raised as Alexis Manigo, arrived at such a shocking thought.

Kamiyah Mobley reportedly plans on remaining in South Carolina for the immediate future. She has not yet announced when she plans on meeting her biological family in Jacksonville.

“She’s taking it as well as you can imagine,” Sheriff Williams continued.

“We have victim’s advocates up there, she has a lot to process, a lot to think about.”

Kamiyah Mobley was not at home on Friday morning when Gloria Williams was arrested. According to court records, Williams has a lengthy criminal record. Her past arrests include charges for welfare fraud and check fraud. About two months after allegedly kidnapping the baby from Florida, she was also charged with disturbing the peace.

Craig Aiken and his mother said they immediately realized how much Kamiyah looked like her father after seeing her for the first time in 18 years, First Coast News.

“I can’t wait,” Craig Aiken said when referencing finally getting to see his daughter.

“It’s been 18 years. I can’t wait no longer. I always hoped and prayed this day would happen. I always felt she was alive. I always felt she would find us. Now we have the rest of our lives together.”

The overjoyed 66-year-old grandmother said she had prayed to get to see Kamiyah again before she died. Vera Aiken also told reporters the family was not pushing for a reunion date yet. The grandmother said they did not want to push Kamiyah and risk losing her again after all of these years.

[Featured Image by Derek R. Audette/Shutterstock]