It was a case that made headlines in Jacksonville, a baby, just hours old, left on a stranger's doorstep in 2021. Annia Smith, who now lives in California, spoke with First Coast news, desperate to find her birth parents. It was around 5:30 on a cold January morning in 1992 when a woman living at the Riviera Parkway Apartments in Riverside found a newborn on her doorstep and called 911. She was just a few hours old. Baby Jane Doe was the name police gave her. It's like a empty feeling that you feel. And. Now, 29, at a mother herself, you just don't know who you are. Ania Smith has so many questions for her birth mother. Why did she do that? So that would be my main question. Growing up, she always wondered about her roots. Do I have brothers and sisters? A huge family? Do they have family reunions every year? Things that I've never experienced? That's what started to pique my interest for her high school graduation gift, her adoptive parents, Lorraine Smith and her husband, who started raising her when she was just a week old. The first moment I saw her brought her back to Jacksonville to search for her biological mother. She was 18 years old. She been waiting. Defined her mother. So I would appreciate if they would just anything then no one name they know of, a cousin or sister, anything that can help us bring closure to this particular situation. In the few days. Annie, I will be here. She's searching for clues about her first day of life. First Coast News was with them when they went back to the apartment complex where Annie was abandoned. And featured her story on television. That was eleven years ago and still no answers. The e-mail that I was using for contact. I've lost access to that e-mail, so it's always been in the back of my mind. Like, what if I missed an e-mail? What if I missed a contact? She recently got the results back from an ancestry DNA test. Another dead end. For that, I was gonna open it and see Mom, dad, sister, cousin, something. And when I didn't get that, I was kind of, I felt helpless. But something in me was like a fire in me that just told me, like, don't give up. While she has a mix of emotion, she wants her birth mother to know this. I'm grateful that you didn't abort me, but I just. I just want to know more. I just want to know you. Because I got the chance to raise the most amazing daughter. I got the daughter I always wanted and I was able to love her and cherish her and see her become a gorgeous young, young person. Now a mother gave me a grandson. That story spread around the country and we were flooded with emails and messages from people wanting to help Anna find her biological family. This has been amazing. A lot of people have reached out to me to help. A few hours old when she was left on a doorstep at the Riviera Parkway Apartments on January 11th, 1992. I think it's important that I get those answers and know who my family is and know you know where exactly I came from. When she recently got the results of an ancestry DNA test, she thought it was a dead end, so she reached out to First Coast news for help. After our story aired, numerous search angels volunteered their services. Search Angel is basically another set of eyes. So the person. They pretty much reach out to everyone for you. They put the family trees together. Leonard Henry, who lives in California, saw her story on Facebook and reached out to help for free. Her story really touched me because I found my birth father three years ago at the age of 31, and it was a long journey and a long process, and it was fulfilling for me to be able to find my father and all my siblings. And so I actually now help other people do the same. In just the past few days, Smith says they have made progress. We've found cousins, we've found great aunts. So we're putting a lot of dots together. Ancestry is never really a dead end. You might not get a very close match, but you can always build on the matches that you have. Her number one piece of advice first take the ancestry DNA test, get your DNA in there and in that database. And then from there, I tell them, don't just use ancestry and. Message on ancestry. Use social media and the Internet to find answers. Step by step, Annie was able to trace her roots. They were shocked. They were really shocked, as you can imagine, no one knew about me. No one even knew that my mom was pregnant. Mystery solved. It took nearly 30 years. But Anna Smith says she finally knows who her birth parents are. Nearly three decades after she was left on a Jacksonville doorstep, a California woman is hoping that this will be the year she finds her biological mother. April 2021 our new story led to a so-called search Angel, a genealogy sleuth offering to help Anna Smith find her. Biological family. A search Angel. Someone who does all of the back end work for you. So they put the families together, they connect the dots and ancestry. DNA test revealed Ania had 1/2 sister and that led her to her father in Jacksonville. Their first phone call, she says included an apology she had waited so long to hear. I appreciated that moment of just him telling me he was truly and deeply sorry and just explaining his mindset, his thought process in the time. She says her father said he and her birth mother left her on a doorstep of an apartment in Jacksonville, Riverside neighborhood in 1992. My mother was 18 at the time. My father was 19. So they were really young, you know, didn't really know what to do. That call with her father helped her connect with her mother's side of the family. Tell me about how you found out about Ania. It was more like Annie or found out about us. Charles Thompson couldn't believe it when he first heard Annia might be his relative. Uncle Butch is she now calls him offered to take a DNA test. I put the puzzle together. He and his brother say they have no doubt Ania is their blood relative. Her DNA didn't match up with my nephew. And. I don't think DNA lied. It was like, wow. But the more important thing how could this have happened? It's one of many questions Ania was finally able to ask her birth mother because I wanted to know the ends and outs about her. Because I had, you know, just thought about who this person could have been for so long. I just wanted to know everything. We called Annie's mother and father, but neither would talk to us. My mom did advise that she didn't leave me. Umm. But I don't believe that. While Ania didn't get all the answers she was looking for, she says she's not angry anymore about being abandoned. She was adopted and raised by a loving family who supported her finding her birth parents and the four brothers and sisters she never knew. She had a deep relationship with my siblings relationship she's building with her newly found relatives. Her great uncle, Tony Thompson, organized the family call to welcome her. It was important that she knew that, that she had a family that. That loved her. She's looking forward to the day when she and her son Zion can meet them all in person. I plan on giving her a. A 30 year hug when I first. Started my journey. I told myself, oh, it's going to be easy, you know, they're going to accept me. They're going to love me, you know, but you just have to be ready for those real emotions and things that you will feel. But just never give up. Hang in there because. It's possible and I'm a living witness. She plans to meet her relatives in person for a family reunion this spring, determined to find her biological family. Ania Smith finally has answers, and she has an extended family who's welcomed her with open arms in Jacksonville. Heather Crawford, First Coast News on your side.
