Plea Made For Abducted Baby Newborn Infant Taken From Hospital Room By Woman The Mother Thought Was Nurse

A 2-day-old baby boy was abducted from a hospital early Saturday by a woman who walked in wearing a white lab coat and was familiar with procedures.

“She looked like she belonged there,” Pierce County sheriff’s spokesman Curt Benson said.

Benson said the woman told officials at St. Clare Hospital in this Tacoma suburb that she was from nearby Madigan Army Hospital and was there to see the baby’s mother, identifying her by name and room number.

The woman went to the women’s care center room, where Melinda Coen, who turns 31 today, was staying with her 9-pound, 5-ounce baby, Stuart.

Benson said the woman asked Coen: “‘Would you like me to take the baby so you can get some sleep?’ The mother, apparently thinking the woman was a nurse or doctor, said ‘Sure.”’

The woman put the infant, who was born Thursday, into a bassinet and rolled it out of the room. A nurse later found the empty bassinet near an exit door about 50 feet from the room.

The boy’s father, John Rembert Sr., 43, issued a tearful plea for the infant’s return.

“From his mother and myself … please take care of him. Treat him as if he were your own and return him safely to any church, hospital, police department - anywhere, so we can get our baby back,” Rembert said at a news conference.

FBI agents and local law enforcement were searching for the baby and the woman, FBI special agent Burdena Pasenelli said.

St. Clare Hospital spokeswoman Diane Gage said security will be stepped up “beyond what is standard practice in hospitals.”

After-hours visitors, who must enter the hospital through the emergency room, now will be allowed into other parts of the building only after patients give their permission.