Metro

‘Fake mom’ admitted to stealing baby in 1987, says she is ‘sorry’ for the pain caused to real parents: feds

The woman accused of kidnapping Carlina White from Harlem Hospital 23 years ago admitted to stealing the baby because she had suffered a miscarriage and later tried to create a fake birth certificate in an attempt to make it look like she was the birth mother, prosecutors said.

In a five-page criminal complaint, federal prosecutors said fake mom Ann Pettway “had difficulty having children of her own” and “had suffered several miscarriages” throughout the 1980s.

In 1987, the court papers allege Pettway went to Harlem Hospital and stole the baby — Carlina White — then later raised the girl in Bridgeport, Conn.

READ THE COMPLAINT

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“Pettway attempted to create a fake birth certificate for the victim, but was unsuccessful in doing so,” prosecutors said. “Pettway was never able to create a fake document that appeared real.”

In the court documents, FBI agent Maria Johnson, who interviewed Pettway, said the woman “is sorry and knows that she has created a lot of pain.”

During a four-minute appearance this afternoon in Manhattan federal court, Pettway’s lawyer did not ask for bail.

Some of her relatives were in the courtroom, along with Carlina’s father, Carl Tyson.

“It was really sad seeing her,” Tyson said. “I don’t believe she’s sorry. I want to know why she did it.”

Pettway’s attorney, Robert Baum, said his client has expressed remorse about the incident and said her family stands behind her and believes she’s a good mother.

He said Pettway was “very upset” during an hour-long interview with her earlier today.

Pettway is due back in court Feb. 7.

Carlina was reunited with her real parents, Joy White and Tyson, last week after she solved her own kidnapping after seeing her baby pictures on a missing children’s website.

PHOTOS: CARLINA WHITE

VIDEO: KIDNAPPED WOMAN GETS MIRACLE REUNION

A cousin, Brian Pettway, told The Post that Ann was pregnant in the summer of 1987 but one day mysteriously dropped out of sight.

“She was pregnant. She disappeared for two months. When she got back, she had [an infant]. We all assumed that she had the baby while she was away. No one questioned it,” said Brian Pettway, 38.

Ann’s mother, Mary, also told The Post that Pettway had been pregnant around that time.

“She was pregnant in 1987,” Mary Pettway said. “I wasn’t with her when she gave birth. [White] was Ann’s daughter until all this came up. I don’t know right now what to think.”

Tyson, Carlina’s father, told The Post that he went to the courthouse so he can see Pettway.

“I would like to see her,” he said. “I would like to ask her why? Why did she put me through all this pain?”

Asked what her punishment should be, Tyson said, “She took [my daughter] for 23 years. So let her do the same amount of time.”

Meanwhile, Bridgeport police sources said trouble is nothing new for the Pettway family.

A database search of Connecticut Superior Court records shows more than 320 criminal cases involving at least 78 different individuals from the Bridgeport area with the surname Pettway since the late 1980s.

“I arrested a number of them in my career. Very intimidating,” a Bridgeport police lieutenant said.

A retired Bridgeport police sergeant who had also arrested members of the family said a number of Pettways were involved in the drug trade on the city’s tough East End and East Side dating to the ’80s.

“They were everywhere, and they ran the crack and coke trade on Stratford Avenue in the ’80s and the ’90s,” he said, referring to a strip notorious for drugs and crime.

The lieutenant said many family members were legitimate businesspeople and law-abiding citizens.