‘Womb-raider’ killer jailed for 50 years after murdering pregnant mum & ripping baby from stomach to pass off as her own
A WOMAN dubbed the “womb-raider” who brutally murdered a pregnant mum and ripped her baby from her stomach has been jailed for 50 years.
Clarisa Figueroa, 51, was sentenced to five decades in prison for her sick plot to steal an expectant mother’s baby to raise as her own.
Figueroa lured pregnant Marlen Ochoa-Lopez, 19, into her home in April 2019 by promising to gift her free baby clothes.
Marlen had earlier issued a call-out for free baby clothes and strollers on social media as she couldn’t afford them.
The twisted killer’s daughter Desiree, who pleaded guilty to murder in January and was sentenced to 30 years’ jail, distracted Marlen by showing her pictures of her dead brother – Figueroa’s son.
Figueroa then leapt into action and strangled the teenage mum with an electrical cord before slicing open her womb.
The killer, a former certified nursing assistant, tried to pass the baby off as her own and called 911 to have the little one rushed to hospital.
Tragically, the baby died two months later.
A court heard that Figueroa had lost a child herself and that, just weeks before the attack, she had told her family she was pregnant again – despite having her fallopian tubes tied years earlier.
Chilling social media posts from the time showed her preparations to welcome a fake baby who she planned to name Xander.
The child who Figueroa lost – just a year before the attack – was 20 years old and named Xander.
In October 2018, months before Marlen was murdered, Figueroa told her daughter Desiree that she “needed help killing a pregnant woman and taking a baby”.
Speaking after Figueroa’s sentencing, Marlen’s grieving mother Raquel Uriostegui said that she would “never overcome” the loss of her daughter.
And Marlen’s distraught husband Yovanny Lopez, who also shared a son with the teen, said through tears: “Your punishment will never be enough because my son will never be able to hug his mother ever.
“I lost my family and that will always stay with me.”
Marlen first visited Figueroa’s home on April 1, 2019 to collect free items for her baby.
Figueroa told Desiree that she wanted to kill her and take her baby – and she did exactly that a few weeks later on April 23, when Marlen returned to the house for more items.
Desiree, who was four months’ pregnant herself, distracted the teenager as Figueroa crept up behind her and wrapped an electrical cable around her neck.
When Marlen had been strangled to death, Figueroa cut her belly open and retrieved her baby, the placenta, and the umbilical cord.
The killer then placed the baby in a bucket with the placenta and wrapped Marlen’s body in a blanket, leaving her in an outdoor trash can with the electrical cable still tied around her neck.
Figueroa called 911 claiming to have just given birth and was found by paramedics covered in blood.
Hospital staff found that she showed “no signs consistent with a woman who had just given birth”.
The baby died after two months in intensive care.
Cops later discovered the plot and arrested Figueroa, Desiree, and Figueroa’s boyfriend Piotr Bobak – who helped in covering up the murder by washing the house of blood.
Marlen’s body and the murder weapon – the electrical cable – were found in Figueroa’s backyard.