The 50-year-old woman, who can not be identified, who took Zephany from her mother’s beside in April 1997 was found guilty.
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Zephany’s true identity was discovered previous year when she was found to bear a remarkable resemblance to a girl she had befriended at school.
She suggested that part of the 15 year sentence for kidnapping, fraud and contravening the Children’s Act be suspended, and that the sentences run concurrently.
Judge John Hlophe said the crimes the woman had committed were of a serious nature, adding that the protection of society and prevention of crime had been considered in his sentencing.
The Nurse family had been living within a couple of kilometres (miles) of their kidnapped daughter, while celebrating her birthday every year and never giving up hope of finding her.
Zephany, who is now said be pregnant, was raised under a different name and has shunned the media spotlight on the case.
Publicly, the girl is known by the name given to her by her biological parents and used in the media in the years since her disappearance.
The name of the condemned girl isn’t being released to shield the victim’s identity, who has asked for her privacy to be honored.
Zephany is the name her biological parents, Celeste and Morne Nurse, gave her shortly after she was born at Cape Town’s Groote Schuur Hospital, South Africa, on April 27, 1997.
“I couldn’t sleep for nights. So the way forward is to build my relationship with my daughter, and that’s it”.
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The woman kidnapped Nurse just three days after her birth in 1997.
