NYC model pleads guilty to taking Toronto baby
CBC News
Posted: Apr 1, 2011 11:18 AM ET
Last Updated: Apr 2, 2011 12:21 PM ET
An aspiring actor and model from New York City has admitted to abducting a Toronto baby at a bogus Bollywood movie casting call last December.
Michelle Marie Gopaul pleaded guilty to one count of child abduction in a Toronto court Friday morning. She has been sentenced to 2 1/2 years in addition to the time she has already spent in custody.
Gopaul, 25, was arrested during the early hours of Dec. 31 after police recovered one-month-old Roma Patel. The baby had gone missing four hours earlier at À la Carte Videos — a western Toronto production studio — during a purported casting call.
The baby's parents had responded to an ad on Craigslist that offered $15,000 in compensation for allowing their baby to be used in a film shoot.
Before she was sentenced Friday, Gopaul tearfully told the judge she was afraid to give the baby back so she handed the infant off to her ex-boyfriend because she knew he would return the child.
She said she had "never been in trouble with the cops before" and didn't know what to do, adding that she was sorry.
"Everyone thinks I'm a bad person but I'm not a bad person," she told the court, shaking and crying.
Her lawyer Gary Batasar told the court Gopaul had been taking medication for sleeping and anxiety and had a history of depression.
Police said at the time of the arrest that Gopaul had been living in Toronto for several months.
With files from The Canadian PressShare Tools
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