Parents who snatched their baby from a foster parent in January last year and took the child to Germany have been jailed for 12 months, four suspended, by judges in Den Bosch.

In addition, baby Hannah’s father was found guilty of physically assaulting the foster mother, by hitting her to force her to give up the child.

The court said the couple had put their own interests ahead of those of the child. ‘In addition, their action had a direct impact on their child because she had to be placed in a new foster family,’ the court said.

The baby and her parents were found on a German holiday park in Bad Bentheim, close to the Dutch border in January 2017, a few days after she was snatched outside a supermarket.

Hanneke was taken into care when she was seven weeks old after social workers became suspicious about two broken ribs sustained by the baby, plus other injuries.

The public prosecution department told the court the couple were fully prepared when they grabbed back the child and had been searching the internet using terms such as ‘escape child services’ and ’emigrate to Portugal’.