PLANT CITY, Fla. — At first glance, it’s an alarming warning.
A social media post circulating in a local neighborhood yard sale group shows a woman dressed in scrubs carrying a baby. The post claims the woman impersonated a nurse and stole the newborn from a local hospital, urging anyone who sees the woman "on the loose" to contact the police.
10 Tampa Bay viewer Amanda H. sent the post to us asking if it was legit, suspicious because she hadn’t heard any news reports.
It’s not.
THE QUESTION
Did a woman impersonating a nurse steal a baby from a hospital in Plant City?
OUR SOURCES
- Plant City Police Department
- Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office
- Google reverse image search
THE ANSWER
No, a post claiming a woman caught on camera impersonating a nurse stole a baby from a hospital in Plant City is fake.
WHAT WE FOUND
Plant City police shared a screenshot of the post warning people not to fall for it. The department said, “a check of the local hospitals did not indicate any missing children.”
The Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office also said it had not heard of any such incident, adding this hoax is making its way across the country.
VERIFY dug some more and found this same phony story and photo have been circulating in other cities.
A Google reverse image search reveals the post has been shared in other community Facebook groups as far away as Canada and England, with just the location of the hospital changed.
Police departments in Texas, Washington and Canada have all debunked the identical post as a hoax.
In reality, the photo is actually surveillance footage from a case in 2016 in Spain when a baby was kidnapped from a hospital, according to local reports.