Netflix documentary A Child of My Own reconstructs the events surrounding the abduction of a newborn from a hospital corridor and the woman convicted in the case. The film uses CCTV footage showing a young woman carrying an oversized gift bag with an infant inside, walking past security staff at the hospital. The documentary follows the case through archival material and interviews to present the sequence of events that led to the child’s removal from hospital custody.
Maite Alberdi, the filmmaker, met the convicted woman in a low-security facility as part of the project. The subject, identified as Eleonor Alejandra Marín Mendoza and commonly referred to as Alejandra, was serving the final year of a 13-year sentence for taking the baby. Alberdi recounts listening to Alejandra’s account and has described the material she gathered as “extraordinary, stranger than fiction.” The film records their conversations alongside the visual record of the hospital incident.
The documentary presents Alejandra’s background as a hospital worker and traces the preparations and actions that preceded the abduction, including the portrayal of a staged pregnancy. CCTV excerpts included in the film show the moment the newborn is carried from the hospital, and contemporaneous images depict security personnel in the vicinity. The film does not adjudicate legal questions but compiles testimony and footage to document how the incident unfolded.
Netflix released the documentary to a global audience, where it is positioned within a broader interest in true-crime storytelling that combines archival evidence and first-person testimony. The film concentrates on the interactions between the director and Alejandra in the Mexican prison setting and on the recorded imagery from the day of the abduction, offering viewers a structured account of the events that led to the criminal conviction and the subsequent imprisonment.
