A 20-year-old woman is due to appear in a South African court for allegedly trying to sell her child for 5,000 rand ($380; £250) on advertising website Gumtree.
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The Hawks say that at first, the mother lied and pretended the child was not hers.
The woman was arrested and the baby handed over to social workers while police try to locate the boy’s family.
Police pounced as she exited the building, money and ice cream in hand.
She stood against a wall, eating her ice cream, as the police questioned her before she was driven away in an unmarked vehicle.
Bobby Bear founder Jackie Branfield commended the police for “stopping the destruction of the boy’s life”. The case was postponed to allow for more investigation, and the woman will remain in custody until the case continues on 26 October. “She gave us the money and we arrested her directly”.
‘Gumtree South Africa’s customer service team was alerted that a young woman had placed an ad on the site advertising a child for sale, ‘ company spokeswoman Claire Cobbledick said in a statement.
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“The team immediately removed the ad and blocked the user’s account”. They met at a KFC in the central city of Pietermaritzburg where she was subsequently arrested, Eyethu News reported.
