Mary is already a mother of two, but she is desperate to have another one. In the early morning of September 20, she was about to be the mother of her third child. She waited with joy for that moment to come.
After the first labor pain, her sister-in-law, Dulosi Lammy, drove Mary to Kaiser Hospital, the most modern and large-scale hospital. Mary's husband, William Childs, was not home at the time.
At nine o'clock in the morning, Marie was admitted to an examination room in the maternity ward, where she was carefully examined by Dr. Walter Ogden and measured the position and size of the fetus. Dr. Ogg told Mary, "The fetus is quite large, about eight and a half pounds in weight, and the fetal sound is very strong. Mary smiled happily. She was taken to the delivery room. The labor pains are getting stronger. At 11:45, Mary's amniotic water bag broke, but Mary still had not yet given birth. After Dr. Ogg left, a nurse came in to adjust the speed of the intravenous drip and left. Mary was left alone and lying quietly. She put her hands on her abdomen and felt the fetus contracting and moving, and she was full of joy. However, she felt dizzy and fell asleep after a while.
At half-past four in the afternoon, Dr. Jack Cartel did not go to duty and hid in a room near the delivery room to sleep. Suddenly, midwife Norma Amisti woke him up. Tell him that Mrs. Mary Childs had given birth alone in the delivery room. Dr. Cartel ran over to see a tiny stillborn boy lying between Mary's legs, while Mary was still asleep. It looked as if the baby had died a few hours before giving birth. But Norma Amisti, a midwife who has delivered many babies for nine years, says she has just discovered dead babies.
The cartel wondered how Mary could have given birth to such a dead fetus as tiny as three pounds and thirteen pounds and halves, when her prediction card clearly stated that she would give birth to a full-term baby. When Dr. Eugene Baghre learned of this, he was also puzzled. He concluded that Dr. Oger had overestimated the baby's weight.
Dr. Cartel's tests on Mary's blood and urine showed signs of morphine and morphine transforms. However, no tranquilizers were prescribed on the prescription.
Mary woke up at nine o'clock the next morning. When she found that her belly had deflated, she looked around for the baby. At this time, several doctors and her sister-in-law hurried in, and seeing their expressions, Mary asked in horror: "Is my child dead?" “
The cartel sadly told Mary that she had given birth to a stillborn child of three pounds and thirteen pounds and halves.
"This can't be, he was still moving when I gave birth! And, foresee that he weighs eight pounds! Mary argued.
The doctor explained that polyhydramnios can lead to a miscalculation of the baby's weight. Despite the encouragement and explanations of others, Mary was in a state of extreme grief. Mary's husband signed and agreed to send the dead baby to be cremated.
A year later, at 8 a.m. on May 17, Los Angeles Police Department criminal investigator Heath was ordered to rush to the murder scene of a star in northern Hollywood.
In one of the bedrooms of the apartment, the body of twenty-eight-year-old Catherine Villamantes lay in a pool of blood. Her throat had been cut, her lower abdominal wall and uterus had been dissected, and her baby in labor was missing. Her eight-year-old son told detectives that the last person to be with his mother was his mother's friend, a nurse named Norma Amist.
Richard and Detective Marshall immediately rushed to Norma's apartment. They only saw Norma's eldest son and daughter caring for a little sister, Celly, who was only eight months old. The child told detectives that their mother had just given birth to a little brother at Kaiser Hospital.
In a clearing near the apartment, Richard found a handbag containing syringes, vials and other medical equipment. There was also a plastic sheeting and towel stained with blood.
Heath rushed to the hospital and saw Norma, a tall, forty-year-old midwife, lying in bed with a newborn baby in a nearby nursery. Norma said she had just given birth in a car on her way to the hospital.
Norma refused to have a health check while hospitalized, and there was no information on the medical record card, and the detectives went to Dr. Duglas Daguchi, the chief obstetrics department, to explain the situation, and Director Dagucci told Noh that she had to be examined. During the examination, Dagucci was surprised to find that Norma had had undergone a hysterectomy and had been for several years.
"Then, this child cannot be born to her." Detective Medek said.
The detectives thought that the eight-month-old baby girl in Norma's family could not have been born to her. Norma may be guilty of murder and child abduction.
Norma was arrested. Sheehan sets out to solve the identity of the baby girl. He visited the Los Angeles Household Registration Office, looked through copies of birth certificates, and found out that Sorlie was born at 4:30 p.m. on September 21, 1974. He rushed to Kaiser Hospital and learned that Norma was working in obstetrics at the time. Phyllis, a clerk, revealed that a few days before Thor was born, a baby boy died in the hospital and suddenly disappeared. A few days later, it was Norma who discovered that Mary Childs had given birth to a dead baby.
Detectives believe that Norma is infertile and swaps the stolen dead baby with the living baby Mary had just born. She took the baby to a nearby children's hospital, fraudulently obtained a birth certificate, and pretended to be the baby's mother.
On May 25, 1975, representatives of Cather Pomannett Hospital in Hollywood came to the door of an ordinary house in the suburb of Duart, Los Angeles, and made a special trip to visit Mary and tell her the truth of the matter. Mary is still so sad that she doesn't want to talk about it again. Three representatives from Kaiser Hospital told her, "We believe your baby is still alive." Mary was dumbfounded as she listened to them tell the story, all of which happened when Norma stole morphine to make her unconscious.
One day later, Mary went to Norma's house. She had just stepped into the living room, where Celly was smiling at her with shining eyes and looking exactly like her daughter Daili had been a few months old. Mary stretched out her arms and shouted, "Come, come to Mommy!" "Thrie crawled towards her...
On June 25, 1975, a Los Angeles court formally returned Thor and William Childers. The parents renamed their youngest daughter Christian Childes. The court also ordered the hospital to pay compensation to Mary and her daughter to repair the trauma.
Norma Amisti was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Catherine Veramantes.