She was kidnapped for 16 days after her birth
Abbie Humphries, a woman who was famously kidnapped as a newborn, has sadly died at the age of 30 from a brain tumour.
Back in 1994 when she was just three hours old, the tot was plucked from her cot at Queen’s Medical Centre, Nottingham, leading to a 16-day search for ‘Baby Abbie’.
After over two weeks of searching for the kidnapped newborn, police received a tip-off which pointed them in the direction of Julie Kelley, a former dental nurse who had been 22 at the time.
This tip for the police turned out to be correct and soon afterwards, Abbie was reunited with her parents Roger and Karen, who had gone on TV to make an appeal for the kidnapper to return their child.
As for how the person who made the tip to the police figured out that Julie Kelley was the kidnapper, they worked it out thanks to one specific clue.
Neighbours picked up on a clue which led the police to this house where they found baby Abbie. (PA)
After being caught by police the former nurse pleaded guilty to abducting Abbie and was put on probation for three years as well treated for a personality disorder.
The clue that had rumbled her was that she’d told neighbours she was pregnant and expecting a baby boy, but when she came back from the hospital she had a baby girl with her.
She had managed to abduct Abbie after waiting for new mum Karen to step out and call her mother, then went in dressed as a nurse and told Roger that she needed to take baby Abbie for a hearing test.
The former nurse then took the newborn and walked out of the hospital, but since she’d told neighbours she’d been expecting a boy it aroused suspicions when she got home.
One of them caught onto the clue and put things together with the public appeal for the missing baby girl so recently kidnapped, alerting the police.
After 16 days the parents were reunited with their kidnapped daughter. (PA)
Abbie Humphries didn’t learn that for the first couple of weeks of her life she’d been abducted until she was around 10 and she found newspaper clippings.
The family ended up moving to New Zealand to start a new life.
In 2020 a TV series called The Secrets She Keeps was released and the plot was loosely based on Abbie’s abduction.
In that same year doctors found a tumour in Abbie’s brain after the woman had been suffering from headaches after her mum died of breast cancer.
Speaking about her diagnosis in 2021, she said: “There is no point feeling angry or blaming anything. We have just had a terrible amount of bad luck.
“I usually choose to look at the positive side of everything. It makes everyone feel better.”
Abbie’s husband Karl Sundgren announced yesterday (9 December) that the 30-year-old had ‘peacefully passed away’ and had been ‘surrounded by loved ones’.
He wrote: “She fought so hard with so much strength and grace for over four years and can finally rest.
“Abbie was so strong, and her infectious smile will forever remain in our hearts.”
