Police investigating the disappearance of a new mother and her baby have found a body of a woman – but the whereabouts of the four-day old child remain unknown.
The family of 30-year-old Charlotte Bevan, who vanished from Bristol Maternity Hospital with her daughter, have been informed of the discovery of the body in the Avon Gorge. A formal identification of the body will take place today, the Daily Telegraph reports.
Bevan was last seen leaving the maternity unit with her baby girl, Zaani Tiana, on Tuesday evening. Hours before she went missing, she had posted a self-help video on her Facebook page entitled "Get through positive and negative thinking rough patches."
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
She did not have a coat or shoes and is thought to have been wearing hospital slippers, while her baby was wrapped only in blankets.
Temperatures overnight in the city were close to freezing. Her family made a desperate appeal for information yesterday, as the police search continued.
A spokesman for University Hospitals Bristol, which runs St Michael's Hospital, said Ms Bevan discharged herself for "reasons unknown to us" and there were no signs she was planning to leave.
"Charlotte and her baby were seen by staff at 20.30. When staff went to check on her at 21.05 they found Charlotte and her baby missing and immediately sounded the alarm," he said.
A friend of Bevan wrote on Facebook that her disappearance was "out of character".
-
Home Office worker accused of spiking mistress’s drink with abortion drugSpeed Read Darren Burke had failed to convince his girlfriend to terminate pregnancy
-
In hock to Moscow: exploring Germany’s woeful energy policySpeed Read Don’t expect Berlin to wean itself off Russian gas any time soon
-
Were Covid restrictions dropped too soon?Speed Read ‘Living with Covid’ is already proving problematic – just look at the travel chaos this week
-
Inclusive Britain: a new strategy for tackling racism in the UKSpeed Read Government has revealed action plan setting out 74 steps that ministers will take
-
Sandy Hook families vs. Remington: a small victory over the gunmakersSpeed Read Last week the families settled a lawsuit for $73m against the manufacturer
-
Farmers vs. walkers: the battle over ‘Britain’s green and pleasant land’Speed Read Updated Countryside Code tells farmers: ‘be nice, say hello, share the space’
-
Motherhood: why are we putting it off?Speed Read Stats show around 50% of women in England and Wales now don’t have children by 30
-
Anti-Semitism in America: a case of double standards?Speed Read Officials were strikingly reluctant to link Texas synagogue attack to anti-Semitism
