Parents Arrested For Kidnapping Infant Daughter

POSTED: 5:16 pm PDT July 13, 2007

UPDATED: 6:19 pm PDT July 13, 2007

PORTERVILLE, Calif. — A Bakersfield couple has been arrested and charged with felony kidnapping after they tried to walk out of a Porterville hospital with their newborn daughter, despite an order not to leave with the child.Jennifer Thompson and Trevor Findley reportedly drove to Tulare County in order to deliver the child. The couple was aware Kern County Child Protective Services was prepared to take the infant upon delivery.Thompson and Findley checked into Sierra View District Hospital, in Porterville, on Monday under assumed names in order to elude CPS officials. Hospital staff discovered the misinformation and told the couple they could not take their infant daughter home Thursday morning.

Instead of leaving the hospital, the two headed upstairs to the hospital’s nursery and took the infant. Hospital staff confronted the two and held them until authorities arrived to arrest them.Thompson is out on $70,000 bail. Findley is also out on $50,000 bail. The couple’s infant daughter, Liberty, is in child protective custody along with the couple’s other child. Authorities would not disclose why the children are in protective custody.