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A child-custody case in Florida has erupted into a battle between state officials and a Native American tribe after a couple complained that their newborn was snatched from a hospital by tribal police based on bogus accusations made by the grandmother, who allegedly does not like the father because he's white.
Rebecca Sanders, a member of the Miccosukee tribe, and Justin Johnson say tribal police came to Baptist Hospital in Kendall, Florida, and took their baby girl, Ingrid Ronan Johnson, two days after her birth on March 14.
A tribal judge granted custody of the baby and Sanders two other children to Sanders' mother, Betty Osceola.
During an emergency closed-door hearing Thursday afternoon, a tribal judge ordered Osceola to give the infant back to Sanders once the mother has arranged safety measures ordered by the court, Osceola's lawyer, Spencer West, told ABC News.
West said Osceola will maintain custody of Sanders two older children, a 12-year-old boy and an 11-year-old girl, but that Sanders will have visitation rights.
Sanders’ attorney, Bradford Cohen, told ABC News he believes the tribal court ultimately made the right decision because he says the court order it issued was not legal.
“In my opinion, the way that it was executed, how it was executed, what was in it, and the name that was on it, I don’t believe it was [legal],” Cohen said.
He went on to add that he believed the order was, in a sense, a “pickup order” for the baby. Since there is no valid U.S. penal code allowing that type of order “without going through the courts of that state,” the order was not valid, Cohen stated.
In addition, the name on the order was incorrect, Cohen said. The baby’s name is Ingrid Ronan, but the name was listed as “Ronan Ingrid Johnson” on the order, according to Cohen.
“If I go to a bank, and I present the check with my name spelled wrong, they’re gonna give it back to me,” he said. “This is a baby. No hospital should have handed over a baby with an order that wasn’t certified, by the way -- they got a photocopy of the order -- and an order where the baby’s name is incorrect.”
The tribal court is a “different court” than what most U.S. citizens are accustomed to, Cohen said. Thursday’s hearing involved two tribal judges, a pew full of elders and a social services worker from the tribe, and “everyone gets a chance to speak.”
Cohen called the tribal court’s decision to return the baby “100 percent correct.”
The ordeal began on March 16, when Micosukee tribe police went Baptist Hospital in the Miami suburb of Kendall and took Sanders' baby from her.
"A police officer and a few security guards came into the room and were talking to me, asking me if I knew what was going on. And I said I didn't know what was going on. He told me that I no longer have custody of my daughter," Sanders, 28, said at a news conference on Wednesday.
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said the tribal police had no right to take Sanders' baby, arguing they used the tribal court to "kidnap" the newborn from a hospital in the Miami-Dade County jurisdiction.