On Wednesday, a Florida judge rejected a plea that would have reduced the 18-year prison sentence of a woman who kidnapped a baby from a hospital in 1998 and raised the child as her own.
Gloria Williams was sentenced in June 2018 to 18 years in prison for posing as a nurse and taking Kamiyah Mobley from a Jacksonville hospital. According to reports, police initially believed Mobley’s mother had given her away as she was 16 when she gave birth.
Williams raised Mobley as her own. However, suspicions arose as Mobley—who Williams named Alexis Manigo—was unable to obtain a driver’s license because she didn’t have a Social Security card. Williams reportedly told Mobley about the kidnapping two years before her arrest.
According to WLTV, Williams filed a motion in December 2021 seeking to reduce her 18-year sentence by half. She has claimed she had suffered a miscarriage before the 1998 kidnapping and may have been experiencing postpartum depression in addition to other mental health issues.
In a letter dated September 2021, Mobley, 23, supported her kidnapper’s early release.
“I had a well-rounded life; and I am an independent, college educated, and deeply spiritual person, because of all my mom gave me. I am fully aware of how our lives came to be, what they are, and how my mom came to be my mom,” she wrote.
“I understand that none of this modifies the truth of the past, Nor does it justify my mom’s actions in any way. I ask for the court’s grace and mercy, as I need my mother home.”
However, on Wednesday, Duval County Circuit Judge Marianne Aho ruled that Williams filed her motion too late. Aho wrote that there was still no “basis to undo the original sentencing judge’s decision” even if the motion was promptly filed.
As part of her plea deal, Williams cannot profit from her crimes while incarcerated, meaning she cannot enter any television, entertainment, or book deal. It is unclear whether she can — or will — appeal Wednesday’s ruling.
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[Featured image: Kamiyah Mobley, Gloria Williams/Facebook]
