Pirates outfielder Jose Tabata's wife is facing the possibility of life in prison after pleading guilty to kidnapping charges in a Florida courtroom Wednesday. Amalia Tabata Pereira took a 2-month-old girl from a migrant worker in March 2009 and pretended the baby was her own. Pereira posed as an immigration officer and told a Plant City, Fla., woman that she and her husband were about to be deported and Pereira needed to take the infant into custody.
The parents agreed to turn the baby over but hours later realized they had been duped and contacted authorities. An Amber Alert was issued, but Pereira returned the child and turned herself in the following day. Pereira reportedly told her husband he had missed the child's birth while he was in Venezuela playing winter ball -- going so far as to send him pictures of a birth.
In court in Tampa on Wednesday, Pereira pleaded guilty to kidnapping, interfering with child custody and impersonating a public officer. She will face sentencing Sept. 30.
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