A Barranquilla man, whose ex-girlfriend devised an elaborate plan to trick him with a fake pregnancy and the birth and death of a fictitious child, uncovered the plot when he discovered the “baby” was in fact a lump of wood.
The 44-year-old man, known as Nibaldo lived with the woman for six months from late 2008, during which time the scheming 36-year-old concocted a way to keep him by her side.
Following the couples split in mid 2009, the pair had casual sexual encounters, and five months ago Nibaldo’s lover announced that she was pregnant.
Nibaldo was ecstatic; despite having three children from a previous relationship, he was excited by the prospect of another, especially as he learned it would be a little girl.
Over the next few weeks Nibaldo gradually lost interest, until his manipulative mistress produced the first ultrasound of the couples two-month-old “baby.”
But in July, when the woman told the proud father-to-be that she had given birth at Barranquilla’s metropolitan hospital, Nibaldo started to think things were possibly not what they seemed.
Nibaldo was told that the baby had been “born sick and was in intensive care,” and efforts by the worried dad to see his child were blocked by the woman, who prevented him from getting past the hospital’s reception area.
On Wednesday the saga took a dramatic turn as the woman told a distraught Nibaldo that their baby had tragically died and that the funeral was scheduled for the same afternoon.
Nibaldo arrived at the new Soledad cemetery torn between emotions of grief and mourning and feelings of confusion and suspicion.
Soon afterwards the woman arrived on a motorcycle carrying a small wooden coffin, which she warned Nibaldo not to try to open.
At this point Nibaldo’s misgivings got the better of him, and just as the tiny box was about to be buried forever, the decision was made to take one final look at the little girl.
When the lid was prized off the baby casket, Nibaldo’s fears were realized; the body of his deceased daughter was in fact a stick wrapped in a sheet.
Police were called in and the desperate woman soon confessed to the whole ordeal, claiming that it was done out of love and in fear of losing the man she loved and couldn’t live without.
This is the second such case in Colombia, as the nation was rocked in 1996 by a story aptly named the “rag belly” affair.