Family returns to find newborn's clothes and keepsakes stolen from Pasadena apartment

PASADENA, TX (KTRK) -- When Shannon Harding and her husband returned to their Pasadena apartment with their 11-week-old daughter, they walked in to find their furniture, but little else.

Missing was the TV, DVR player, but what brought Harding to tears was what had been taken from her infant daughter.

"Her bouncer chair was gone, her swing where she'd fall asleep, all her clothes, shoes, diapers, even half-empty baby powder containers."

Eleven-week-old Annabella has the clothes that her parents took for her on their out-of-town trip, as well as her crib.

"They even took the ultrasound pictures, and the end of the umbilical cord they gave me when she was born," said Harding, in tears.

The burglary occurred over a period of days, Harding believes, and in a very stealthy way.

The route the thief took was through a small utility crawl-through beneath the stairs. It opens into Harding's kitchen. A matching door is on the other side of the stairs, outside the apartment unit.

The apartment manager had the entrance boarded over so the thief can't return for what's left.

Harding was also tipped off to a Facebook page offering what she says are her daughter's clothes for sale. After she contacted the person on the other end of the page, it was taken down.

She's filed a report with Pasadena police and a detective is investigating. She says she knows who did it, but that person hasn't been charged, at least yet.

"One day my daughter will ask where her baby keepsakes are, and I'll have to tell her there are bad people in the world. You never want to tell your child something like that," she said.

The family has no insurance and limited income. Harding has set up a Gofundme account, at Shannon Groves Harding.