Would anyone like to consider baby-snatching from the viewpoint of the abductor?

Initially, Mr and Mrs Humphries were at the top of the list, after their daughter Abbie was abducted in Nottingham. Then they had the joy of her return, and finding that she had been well cared for, plus a huge cash reward which hopefully will brighten the rest of their lives. The victims, now, are those who, in the footsteps of the abductor, Julie Kelley, were driven as she was towards a child snatch, by a legal system and national Press hell-bent on creating such breakdowns.

Consider the events from their viewpoint. You have suffered a catastrophic personal loss (a regretted abortion, miscarriage, stillbirth, cot death, or you are devastated by infertility or having a child snatched away into care because you have suffered depression or other illness. Or you’ve expected a baby, your family and friends are delighted, and then you’re coldly told that it was phantom pregnancy. On that day you’re too shattered to tell your family, so you leave it for a while (each day finding that it gets still more difficult). You start hallucinating and fantasising that perhaps the doctors are wrong; you will have a baby. You’re so convinced of this that you start padding to convince others who are beginning to doubt.

Then you read about Julie (or the latest woman to be arrested for a baby-snatch). It’s you reading in the papers that the police understand and empathise with you and know you won’t harm Abbie (or the latest abducted child); it’s you being arrested in a t.v. spectacular; you who realise that the understanding and empathy have gone, for the police are putting you in a cell; it’s you flanked by male and female police in the dock and then led away to jail in handcuffs; then a fortnight later again, you are found fit for bail at a secret place, and its you awaiting the agony of trial and likely imprisonment.

All this time, it’s you being ripped apart by the tabloids to increase sales among the prurient. And what effect does this have? You are brought to a state of terror, not daring to confide in a doctor or relatives that you’re just like Julie.

You’re in the state where you look at babies in prams and in their mothers’ arms, thinking “If only that was mine, and I was cuddling.” After weeks or months, a little more fancifully, it may become “If only that was my baby and I’m letting a friend cuddle it.” And then, finally: “He/she’s mine, miraculously brought to life, with someone else laying claim. I’ve got to get him/her away and home.”

This progressive delusion can be broken with someone’s sympathetic help . . . but you’ve cut off from friends and doctors. The legal system has created a situation in which you may baby-snatch, for an illness and delusion cannot be deterred; fear makes it worse. Nottingham police were receiving advice from a psychiatrist while Abbie Humphries was missing, and he, presumably, was responsible for the “caring, understanding . . . we know you won’t harm Abbie” information. It served a treble purpose: reassuring the parents that their child was in caring hands; allowing Julie Kelley and any of her friends who might suspect that she was the abductor to contact the police; and ensuring that Julie would not panic, feel driven to suicide and perhaps take the baby with her.

The message to future abductors is: don’t trust police; they want you behind bars. The consequence was that several “copy-cat” snatches occurred in the next few months (and if these are the spontaneous type, babies’ lives could be at risk, for the abductor may be schizophrenic or psychopathic. It would be far wiser if empathy and counselling were proffered before, during and after an abduction. If the child has not been harmed, and there is evidence of care, an arrested woman should immediately be offered a period of psychiatric care. If she accepts, she should never be named or shamed. It should be recognised that baby-snatchers are ill, not criminal.