Baby ‘abducted’ as mom worked in bus terminal

CEBU, Philippines - A woman is asking the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group-7 office to help find her three-month-old baby who was allegedly abducted by a woman inside the Cebu South Bus Terminal Monday last week.

Maricel Enriquez, 31, of Barangay Kalunasan, Cebu City, a vendor inside the terminal, went to the CIDG-7 office yesterday morning to ask for help in finding her daughter, Lady Love, the youngest of her five children.

Enriquez said she already went to the Carbon Police Station and reported her missing baby but since she was not contented with the action taken, she went to the CIDG.

According to Enriquez, at around 2 p.m. on Monday last week, while she was selling candies with her baby at the bus terminal, a woman, who seemed to be in her legal age, approached her bringing a bag.

Enriquez said the woman requested to leave her bag beside her vending stall while she would wait for her husband who was the conductor of one of the bus lines in the terminal.

“Maghuwat kuno siya kay iya ihatod ang uniform sa iyang bana,” said Enriquez, adding they then had a conversation.

She said minutes later the woman asked if she could hold Lady Love since she is fond of babies.

Finding nothing suspicious about the woman, Enriquez said she just let the woman carry Lady Love while they continued chatting.  As the hours passed by Enriquez said she became busy entertaining customers and forgot about her daughter.

“Nalinga lang ko kay daghan kaayo namalit,” said Enriquez.

It was around 6 p.m. when she remembered Lady Love. She said only the bag was left behind and her baby and the woman were nowhere to be found. Enriquez tried looking for the woman and her baby around the terminal but she failed to find them.

Enriquez said she did not expect the woman to have bad motives since she looked very decent.

“Wa gyud ko nag-expect nga sa kadugay namo nga nag-istorya-istorya, naa diay siya’y lahi nga motibo. Naghagwa-hagwa pa siya sa bata,” said Enriquez.

She said she immediately reported the incident to the Carbon Police Station who also responded to the alarm. However, she said she was not contented with the action taken.

Police Officer 1 Dennis Ornopia, desk officer at the Carbon Police Station, said he was the one who recorded the incident when Enriquez asked for their help.

Ornopia said when the mother went to their police station, they received reports that Enriquez was the aunt of two street kids seen always loafing around the bus terminal who allegedly steal items from the bags of passengers coming in and going out of the terminal.

He said even with the report they received, they still went to the bus terminal to find the woman who allegedly took her daughter. However, they did not find them.

Ornopia said they tried to get a copy of the footage from security cameras installed inside the terminal but no operator could help them at the time. Because of this he said they told Enriquez to return to the police station in the morning and give them a copy of the footage. However, Enriquez allegedly no longer returned to their police station after that.

“Unsaon man namo pagtabang niya nga wala na man siya nagpakita?” said Ornopia.

He said it also came to mind that Enriquez may have been interested in what was in the bag brought by the woman which was why she just let the woman carry her daughter even though they are complete strangers.

The bag left behind by the woman only contained make-up products, a notebook and a wallet with a receipt from a remittance center with the name of the male sender and the name of the recipient of the money who was a woman.

Enriquez said she tried calling the number of the woman in the receipt but the woman replied in a text denying she was the one who took Lady Love.

Yesterday morning, Enriquez talked with the CIDG-7 chief investigator, Senior Inspector Delfin Bontuyan, and showed him the picture of the woman from the CCTV footage. However, the photo was so blurry.

Bontuyan said he just took the number since they will try to contact the owner of the cellular phone. — /BRP (FREEMAN)