A woman who allegedly stole a newborn baby at Groote Schuur Hospital 18 years ago is expected to appear in the Cape Town District Court on Friday. Levina Sabena Solomon, 50, of Lavender Hill on the Cape Flats, appeared last month a day after being arrested on February 26.

She is charged with kidnapping Zephany Nurse on April 30, 1997 at the hospital. Zephany was found after her biological parents’ second daughter, born four years after Zephany’s disappearance, started grade eight at a school in Cape Town this year.

Classmates kept telling her a girl in matric looked just like her. The two girls became friends and eventually the younger girl’s father pretended he wanted to meet his daughter’s new friend.

The likeness was remarkable and he approached the police. The older girl’s parents could not show them any record of her birth. They got permission to take DNA, and confirmed her identity. SAPA