In Pittsburgh yesterday the Johnson's family reported their pregnant daughter, 18 year old Kia Johnson, missing to police. Her due date was July 30.

A woman, Curry-Demus, showed up at the local hospital last Thursday claiming she had just given birth to a newborn that still had its umbilical cord attached. But something was very wrong with the picture and it didn’t take long for staff to prove via tests that she was not the mother.

Curry-Demus told police she miscarried in June, not wanting to upset her mother by telling her she had lost the baby she decided to buy one. Apparently she befriended a pregnant woman named Tina and had just paid $1,000 for the child.

Still things didn’t add up, especially when a foul odor was reported to be coming from her apartment.

Last Friday an unidentified woman’s body bound in duct tape, her head sealed in plastic, was found inside Curry-Demus' Wilkinsburg apartment. Although the cause of death could not yet be determined, she appeared to have been dead for about two days. The police department reported finding a lot of evidence indicating a struggle had occurred and that the dead woman had been pregnant, however, her baby was no where to be found. Why? Because her abdomen had been opened with a sharp weapon, along with her the uterus and detectives found placenta at the scene.

The Allegheny County Medical Examiner's office has tentatively identified the victim as Kia Johnson, stating that:

"Circumstances would dictate that it has to be. There can't be too many cases similar to this at the same time".

The really frightening thing is that this isn’t Curry-Demus’s first attempt at butchering someone for a baby. In 1990, Curry-Demus, then known as Andrea Curry, was accused of stabbing a Wilkinsburg woman in an alleged plot to steal the woman's infant. A day after the stabbing, Curry-Demus snatched a 3-week-old baby girl from Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh. The baby was found unharmed with Curry-Demus at her home the next day.

Curry-Demus pleaded guilty in 1991 to various charges related to both incidents and was sentenced to 3 to 10 years in prison. However, she was paroled 7 years later.

Curry-Demus has been charged with child endangerment and dealing in infant children. She has been jailed with a $10,000 bond and a psychiatric exam. Further charges are expected once the body has been officially identified through dental records.

What pushes another woman to such lengths to obtain a child? Surely she should have been getting counseling during her last stint in prison, but our system has cracks and she might have been over looked. And is she did get help …. It clearly didn’t work. We obviously need better evaluation processes before we parole.

The baby is doing well.

UPDATE: Andrea Curry-Demus, 38, of Wilkinsburg, has been charged with the death of Kia Johnson, 18, of McKeesport. Along with unlawful restraint and kidnapping of the new born baby boy.

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