The lawyer for an 18 year-old who has admitted kidnapping an 11 day-old baby says her client believed she was taking the child for a friend who had put it up for adoption.
Sydnee Toulapapa appeared this morning in the High Court in Auckland, where she admitted charges of kidnapping and burglary.
The charges relate to her taking an 11-day-old baby from a home in the Auckland suburb of Epsom in August last year.
The baby was later found safe, and hours later returned to her parents in the afternoon.
Police at the time said the baby's parents were distraught, and had gone through a "terrible ordeal".
Her co-accused, Nadene Manukau-Togiavalu, admitted the same charges yesterday in the Auckland District Court, as well as a charge of criminal harassment and making an intimate visual recording.
Crown prosecutor Kirsten Lummis said Manukau-Togiavalu had faked a pregnancy for nine months.
She took a job as a nanny with a family who had been trying for years to have a family.
On her third day at work, Manukau-Togiavalu organised for Toulapapa to take the 11 day-old baby.
Toulapapa's lawyer Annabel Cresswell said her client believed Manukau-Togiavalu had put her baby up for adoption and she was helping to get the baby back.
Ms Cresswell said the Crown was arguing part of Toulapapa's motivation was money, but that was not the case.
Justice Brewer summed it up as being a case of either acting as Robin Hood or acting for herself. He agreed that if money had been part of Toulapapa's motivation then it could have a bearing on sentence.
He said if Ms Cresswell and the Crown could not agree on the point then it might need to go to a disputed facts hearing.
Ms Cresswell said her client had no criminal history and there had been no issues while she had been on bail.
Justice Brewer allowed bail to continue until Toulapapa's sentencing date next month.
