Mom Speaks Out On Baby Switch
Both sides in the case of two 3-year-old girls who were apparently switched shortly after birth want to keep decisions on the children's future among themselves rather than in the courts.
Paula Johnson, who learned last month that the girl she named Callie Marie was not her biological child, said Tuesday that no decision has been made on whether the two girls would be exchanged.
She was accompanied at the news conference by her lawyer, Cynthia A. Johnson (the two are not related) who said earlier: "All the parties have come together."
Asked what she thought when she first saw a photo of Rebecca, Johnson said: "That she was a beautiful child and that she looks like me."
And when asked about the child she is raising, she said, sobbing: "This child is absolutely wonderful."
"All of my children are...very upset," she said. "My two oldest boys, they want to know how Callie's...going to understand any of this... They want to know how...I'm going to tell her."
CBS News Correspondent Eric Engberg reports that Johnson and her ex-boyfriend learned last month at Callie was not theirs. There had been a switch at the hospital.
This forced the University of Virginia Medical Center, in Charlottesville, Va., where Callie was born, to scour the records of other births the day Callie was born.
The trail led to the small mountain town of Buena Vista, Va., where 3-year-old Rebecca Chittum lives with her grandparents. And the sad story has grown even sadder.
Rebecca lives with her grandparents because the couple she knew as her parents are both dead. They were killed in an auto accident July 4 — without knowing about the switch.
"This is just awful," Rosa Chittum, Rebecca's paternal grandmother, said Monday.
"I don't have any idea how they're going to tell her," said Mary Watts, Rebecca's great-aunt. "My sister's about going crazy."
The hospital has confirmed a switch took place, but more DNA testing will be needed to firmly establish the mother of each child. Family members are now deciding whether to authorize the tests, but say there will be no attempt to make either child leave her home.
Michael Irvine, attorney for the Rebecca's paternal grandparents, told CBS 'This Morning' Co-Anchor Jane Robelot that custody will need to be worked out privately.
"The paternal grandparents and maternal grandparents have entered into a shared custody arrangement," Irvine said. "If it's determined that Rebecca has a biological mother, or if Miss Johnson is the biological mother...we hope to include her in that arrangement, so that all the families can share and spend a considerable amount of time with Rebecca."
The Virginia Medical Center insists its newborn identification procedures, which involve bracelets on mother and newborn, made an accident impossible and has turned the case over to police. But no one has offered up a reason wy anyone would purposely plot such a tragedy.