Stolen Child Found... 37 Years Later

AFTER nearly four decades Nicole culverhouse finds her family.

FOR most of her life Nicole Culverhouse had flashbacks about her Colombian family. She moved to the United States when she was four years old, legally adopted from a well- established orphanage in Bogota. 

While Nicole was well cared for and had a happy childhood living with her adoptive parents and four adopted siblings, she harboured an emptiness inside, a sense of not belonging. And it was apparent that she didn’t look like the rest of the family. 

Nicole had been kidnapped as a child. She grew up haunted by memories of the last moments she spent with her biological brother Jose, who was then six years old. They were in a neighbourhood park on the outskirts of Bogota, while their mother, Ana Luisa Blanco, was preparing lunch in a nearby restaurant. Jose got thirsty and went to get a soft drink. 

“On the day I left, my brother and I had a little squabble,” recalled Nicole. “He left and I crawled down a wall in tears when a lady, dressed in a long black coat, came over to ask me why I was crying. She spoke very nicely to me. I told her that my brother left me. Maybe she thought I was abandoned. Then she took me with her.” Nicole never returned home. A local newspaper reported that a woman called the family demanding a $700 ransom, but they couldn’t afford it. She never called back. News of the girl’s abduction was broadcast on the radio, but there were no pictures of Nicole and slowly the incident faded from public view.