Woman killed to get baby

CHICAGO (AP) - A woman and two men have been charged with stabbing a couple to death and taking their two children so that she could pass off the baby girl as her own.

Adriana Mejia, 22, allegedly convinced her cousin Arturo Leon and an acquaintance, Gabriel Solache, to help her kill Mariano Soto, a factory worker, and his wife, Jacinita, on 28 March. The motive was to steal the couple's two-month-old baby, Guadalupe Marie, whom Ms Mejia had spotted at a Chicago health clinic.

Police retrieved the children on Friday when the accused woman's husband took the boy to police. Ms Mejia, Mr Leon and Mr Solache were charged on Sunday with first-degree murder.

Ms Mejia had been trying unsuccessfully to have a baby since she got married four years ago, police say. They say she fooled her husband into believing she was pregnant and told him she was going to the hospital to have her baby. Two days after the killings, she arrived home with the baby and its three-year-old brother. She told her husband was caring for the boy because his mother had had complications with her pregnancy.