JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — (The video above is from a previous report)
A judge has dismissed a request from Gloria Williams, the woman convicted of kidnapping Kamiyah Mobley from a Jacksonville hospital back in 1998, to have her sentenced reduced from 18 years to 9 years.
This despite a plea from Mobley who asked the judge to show mercy to the adult woman who kidnapped and raised her.
In a court filing, the judge ruled Williams' motion was not filed in a timely manner. However, even after considering the motion, the judge "did not find a basis to undo the original sentencing judges' decision," according to the filing.
Williams was sentenced to 18 years behind bars in June 2018 for kidnapping Mobley in 1998 – a Jacksonville case that grabbed national headlines.
Williams wanted that sentence cut in half. You can read the full motion here.
“I have a new perspective on life as a result of my experiences while incarcerated. Rehabilitation within the Department of Corrections comes only to those who sincerely desire to strive for self-betterment and change,” Williams wrote in her motion.
Williams stole Mobley from University Medical Center (now UF Health Jacksonville) in July 1998 while posing as a nurse. She befriended Kamiyah Mobley's mother, Shanara Mobley, who was 15 years old at the time, then stole her baby eight hours after she was born.
The kidnapping sparked a months long manhunt for the child and her abductor – ultimately unsuccessful until January 2017, when police arrested Williams at her home in Walterboro, S.C.
Mobley -- living with the name Alexis Manigo -- was 18 at the time.
Williams pleaded guilty to kidnapping and interference with child custody, and was sentenced to 18 years in prison. As part of her plea deal, Williams is barred from profiting from her crime while in prison, meaning she cannot sign a book, TV or entertainment deal.
Williams previously told the court that when she committed the crime, she “had just suffered a devastating miscarriage and was exhibiting symptoms conducive to postpartum depression, as well as experiencing extreme mental and emotional disturbance. At the time she took the child, she was not in her right state of mind.”
In her December motion, she cited community service and faith and character classes she has taken while incarcerated.
The filing included a handwritten letter from Mobley which said in part, “I am writing this letter in support of my mother, Gloria Williams. I would like to make it very clear that she is my mother. She raised me, and not only provided for my needs, but she loved me unconditionally.”
She added that she was the person she is, “an independent, college-educated, and deeply spiritual person because of all my mom gave me.”