A 24year-old pregnant woman murdered while her unborn child was cut out of her womb after being ‘lured to a fake baby shower by a friend who was obsessed with stealing a child’.

Flavia Godinho Mafra was murdered in Brazil by a friend’s partner, whose wife had become obsessed with stealing a baby after having a miscarriage.

The husband and wife lured her to the murder scene on the pretence of a baby shower.

Flavia Godinho Mafra was 36 weeks pregnant when she was murdered in the town of Canelinha, in the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina.

The partner of her school friend admitted using a brick to kill her after luring her to the murder scene on the pretence of a baby shower, local media reported.

The friend confessed to having become obsessed with stealing a child after she had a miscarriage earlier this year, police said.

The detective responsible for the case, Paulo Alexandre Freyesleben e Silva, confirmed that the cause of death of the 24-year-old victim was a sharp cut to the abdomen and wounds from a brick, according to national newspaper G1.

The body was reportedly found by the victim’s husband and mother at around 9am on Friday.

It had been dumped in an abandoned pottery yard in the Galera neighbourhood.. The baby was missing.

Police later found it had been taken to the hospital by the suspect and her husband, who were both arrested.

According to the police investigation, the arrested woman, who was an old school friend of the victim, told the police officer she had lost a child due to a miscarriage in January and had become obsessed with stealing a child.

According to NSC Total, the baby girl remains in the Children’s Hospital of Florianopolis, where she has been given antibiotics and pain medication for the injuries sustained when she was ripped from her mother’s belly, but is otherwise in good general health.

The autopsy will confirm if the baby was removed with the pregnant woman alive or if she was already dead.

Flavia, who studied pedagogy and worked as a substitute teacher, was buried in the Municipal Cemetery of Canelinha after a brief ceremony.