Freedom

When they have taken everything from us,
And we look around and realize
We have nothing left to lose.

We no longer fear the consequences
Of holding people accountable.
What more, after all, can they do?

This is freedom.
Without fear,
Without chains,
Without guilt.

They break us, They abuse us,
They create systems to destroy our families,
To miseducate us,
To imprison us when we try to fight back.
They try to take our souls.
But They can not.
We are too strong for Them.

So I help, I sacrifice,
materials, time, my self,
For the good of humanity.
For the good of family preservation,
For peace and justice.

And They sit back,
And They watch.
Wondering what I will write next.
Wondering what I will do next.
Wondering when They will be given orders,
To try to break me again.
And how.
And They get cold shivers
Down their back,
As They realize,
I am writing about Them.

 

Irregularities in Adoptions in Vietnam

Adopted Children Immigrant Visa Unit
Summary of Irregularities in Adoptions in Vietnam
http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/irreg_adoptions042508.html

On October 25, 2007 in response to “growing concerns about
irregularities in the methods used to identify children for adoption
in Vietnam and the resulting difficulties in classifying those
children as orphans,” USCIS required that I-600 petitions be filed in
Ho Chi Minh City, with the processing of these petitions to be
completed before prospective adoptive parents travel to Vietnam. These
procedures enable USCIS to determine whether a child qualifies as an
orphan, as defined by the Immigration and Nationality Act. In the six
months since this program was instituted, US officials in Vietnam have
investigated over 300 I-600 petitions. This report presents a summary
of our findings.

 

Miscarry

April 20, 2008

The Love we had,
so intense
It created life.
How quickly,
it Miscarries.
How quickly
You forget about me.

The good times,
Don’t compare,
To the cold comforts
Of the past.

And so I am letting
Go of you.
Of the love I
had for you.
I’m not giving up
On love,
Just letting go
Of you.

 

DI WELLFARE, 1950-2008 from Australia

I saw this on Bastardette, for their tribute to Di Wellfare

For all those people who say that first parents aren’t parents because we didn’t do this and that for our children.

Di Wellfare says:

Don’t flatter yourself too much about parenting. It hardly takes intellect, just instinct. Even monkeys do it hanging upside down in a tree, scratching their bums at the same time. In case you still don’t get it, which you obviously won’t, it means: don’t think you’re superior because you parent. Even monkeys do it.

…you sure you can’t hang upside down in trees?……oh nevermind.
You’d never get it.
Di

 

Adoption Kool-aid? Me??

One of the advantages of short term memory loss, is that I actually don’t remember having spewed out the raspberry red kool-aid that had been injected into my IV while in the hospital.

My situation was obviously coercive. Lawyer (Michael Shorstein) and Agency Director (Kathleen Stevens) coming into my room the day after my daughter was born, not leaving until I signed papers, and not taking no for an answer.

“But, I want to keep my daughter”

“I do not know any services available to allow you to do so.”

“You need to pick an adoptive family, who are financially and emotionally stable.”

Financially, yes. Emotionally stable? FAT CHANCE.

Even so, because I received a picture here and there for three years, I would say that I “chose” adoption. That, really, this was the best for my daughter. Even though there was strong evidence that her adopters were liars and crazy. “Yes, we’ll call you from the hospital when we pick her up, and you can say goodbye” – direct lie, no phone call ever.

In 2002, when my baby was just four, I was spewing the kool-aid crap to my current partner. Of course, he even realizes that the reason why… was because I had to believe it. Because I had to think of them in good light, so that I might get another picture. If I showed any sign of being not grateful for adoption, they might stop.

But, like the abusers story, the reason they stopped had nothing to do with me, and everything to do with them. Because, they are liars and abusers.

And, even though I received nothing from them, between 2001 and 2004, still I had hope. And, when the agency found them in 2004, and I received an album from them, in April, my daughter’s birthday, I had a sinking feeling in my stomach. I knew they had never meant to keep the adoption open. They did not respond to any of my questions, they continued to evade the whole, “I want to make you comfortable, how often would you commit to sending me pictures and updates” question. They just paraded about how smart my daughter was, what her favorite color, food, and so on was. I knew it was superficial. But still I tried…

And when I sent them a letter again in the fall of 2004, and Kathleen stated, “I’m sorry, Heather, they moved again. I’m unwilling to search for them again. Dana is obviously insecure, and does not intend to be in an open relationship.”

That was when I vomited up all of the kool-aid, and began my crusade against the adoption industry. Starting off, with helping my friend Allison Quets to fight against them to try to get her babies back. Because, Shorstein had coerced her, too.

Update: My daughter doesn’t even know she’s adopted. Her parents are getting divorced, and her “adoptive mother” is over-controlling, objectifying all of her relationships, and my daughter has become her cheerleader. They still refuse to respond to any of my requests for updates or visits, because the adoptive mother wants to keep the illusion that she gave birth to my daughter.

 

Judge says adoptive parents hid pregnancy

http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/articles/2008/02/16/news/nebraska/c083ed00ab05ad7e862573f10013a2b2.txt

OMAHA (AP) — A judge has ordered a couple to return a baby boy they were trying to adopt, saying the couple should have revealed that the woman was pregnant during the adoption process.

Judge Patrick Rogers of Knox County District Court said the parents trying to adopt the boy, Jason and Angela Vesely, were not honest with the adoption agency.

And Rogers said the Veselys violated the trust of the 22-year-old biological mother, Megan Lynn Morgan of Sutherland. Morgan stopped supporting the placement because it would have violated conditions she set for the adoption.

“They should have, at the very least, understood that the fact that Angela was pregnant was a fundamental change in their circumstances and that it impacted their relationship with the relator (Nebraska Children’s Home) and the birth mother, and they needed to disclose that fact,” Rogers wrote.

The ruling was filed Friday morning, but it was actually issued late Thursday.

“It was absolutely the best Valentine present that one could ever hope for,” said attorney P. Stephen Potter, who represented the biological mother and her family. “They were just really pleased the system had worked.”

The 3-month-old boy’s mother has said she wanted her son to be an only child with the adoptive family and that she wanted an open adoption.

Potter said Megan Morgan’s mom asked the Veselys whether Angela was pregnant during an adoption interview last fall.

“She was informed, ‘Oh no, she’s just a little chubby,’ when in fact, she was pregnant,” Potter said.

Rogers said in his ruling that the Veselys’ pregnancy wasn’t a surprise, because they used in vitro fertilization to create it, and they knew she was pregnant in July.

The agency confronted the Veselys after finding out that Angela was pregnant in December, and the Veselys were told they had to return the boy.

Instead, the couple turned to the courts, and they were granted emergency guardianship of the baby. Judge Rogers’ ruling granted a motion the agency had filed asking the judge to order the Veselys to turn over the baby.

“We’re just really devastated,” Jason Vesely said to the Norfolk Daily News.

He would not comment when contacted by The Associated Press.

Earlier, Angela Vesely, 32, had said she planned to tell the biological mother, Megan Lynn Morgan of Sutherland, and a caseworker about her pregnancy but was waiting because she had miscarried three children previously.

Jason Vesely has said his wife was more than four months pregnant when the agency assigned the child to them. They applied to adopt in 2005.

Nebraska Children’s Home Society executive director Karen Authier praised the judge’s ruling.

“We believe the judge showed wisdom and understanding of the adoption process,” Authier said in a statement. “His decision reflects careful consideration of the long-term needs of the child and safeguards the adoption process.”

Potter said the biological mother and her family don’t believe the problems with this adoption were the Nebraska Children’s Home’s fault.

The agency’s eligibility requirements state that couples with children under 18 months cannot apply to adopt children from the agency. And couples must wait until their own children are 2 years old before the agency will place a child with them.

The baby had been living with the Veselys in Verdigre, in northeast Nebraska, since four days after he was born in North Platte.

The agency plans to place the boy with the biological mother’s parents. Potter said that should happen sometime Friday afternoon if all goes according to plan.

The boy will be known as Brett Jonathan Morgan, and not Morgan Jason Vesely, once he is placed with the Morgans.

The biological mother had also filed a separate lawsuit in Lincoln County asking a judge to invalidate the original adoption agreement she signed with the Nebraska Children’s Home Society and grant her permanent custody. Potter said the Morgans had not decided what to do about that case yet, but it will likely be dropped.

 

One story of the Magdalene sisters

Best of Times, Worst of Times: John Rogers

August 19, 2007
Best of Times, Worst of Times: John Rogers
The Irish-born writer, 60, only found out who his mother was when he was taken by his foster mother to visit her in a Catholic workhouse, one of Ireland’s infamous Magdalene laundries. She had been told she would never get out. Here he recalls her ordeal and how she never gave up on seeing her only son again

I first met my mother when I was 14. It was one of the most traumatic days of my life. I was standing in a room with religious paintings on every wall. On a large mantelpiece were statues of St Martin and St Anthony, while above hung a lifesize crucifix of Our Lord. Beside me was my foster mother, Mrs O’Brien, and in front of me was a nun in a white veil and black habit. As I wondered what kind of place this was, a young woman came in, gaunt and pale, with dark hair. The nun said this was my mother, Bridie, and she rushed over to hug me. Her affection was so overwhelming I could not speak, but the happiness on her face is something I’ll never forget. She had waited 13 years for this moment. She gently took my hand and led me into the grounds at the back, which were enclosed by high stone walls. As we walked around, all these women were waving at us from the windows. At the end of the path was a grotto of Our Lady. There we turned around and went back inside. She told me she loved me and kissed me goodbye.

I did not know where I was that day but, as I later found out, it was a church institution in Galway run by the Sisters of Mercy, a Magdalene laundry. Everyone knew it — their vans went all over the county picking up and delivering hotel linens, suits, priests’ vestments. I was then in the care of the O’Briens, who I’d been fostered out to when I was about five. I’d often ask about my real mother, but was told I was too young to understand.

Ireland back then was ruled by the church and riddled with stigmas. One huge stigma was being an unmarried mother. You were the dregs of society, a “fallen woman”. My mother was a fallen woman. At 16 she was raped by a boy who worked on the estate where she’d got her first job as a maid. She didn’t realise she was pregnant until she was seven months gone, and then she was sacked. Facing destitution, she was given the address of St Mary’s, a home in Galway for unmarried pregnant women run by Bon Secours nuns. In reality it was a workhouse, and once she gave birth to me she was pressurised to give me up for adoption. Most mothers succumbed, but she refused.

After 13 months at St Mary’s, a Sister Imelda told her they’d found her a lovely job in Galway and that they’d look after her baby until she got on her feet. It was a lie. She was driven to the Magdalene laundry, where she was given a calico gown, a cap, a bar of soap and a towel and put to work, washing and ironing for 10 hours a day. Her dormitory of 50 women was one of three. She got food, no pay. She wasn’t allowed out, or to see or contact anyone. The women were all unmarried mothers and orphans, young, old, alone or abandoned. Unless a family member took you away, you were there for life. My mother had no one. She’d been picked up on the streets of Dublin, aged two, and sent to St Joseph’s, a children’s workhouse in Galway, where she stayed until she was 16. When she gave birth to me, she says, it was the first time in her life she’d had someone. At Magdalene, it was the hope that she’d see me again that kept her going. For 10 years she pleaded to be allowed to find out where I was. The nuns told her to forget about me. They said she’d never leave. Anyone who tried to escape had their head shaved and their food confiscated. She’d never encountered such cruel nuns, and yet one sister in the end became her saviour. Her name was Sister Philomena and, risking her own expulsion, she found out the name and address of the O’Briens.

From that day on, my mother began to find ways of secretly sending us letters. She heard nothing for months, but the next year she was handed a package. It contained a letter from Mrs O’Brien and a letter from me. I can’t imagine how emotional that must have been for her.

It was 1955. I was about eight and my mother 27. From then on, the letters continued and I wrote back every time. The O’Briens were good people, they loved me like their own son, but they knew she was my mother and eventually agreed to her wish for us to visit her. The first time we went, we were turned away. The second time, they let us in, and that was the day I first saw her.

Now she was determined to get out. On the first Sunday before September 8 — Our Lady’s birthday — when everyone was in the chapel praying, my mother and two friends took their chance. On a part of the high wall hidden by trees, they formed a human chain and climbed up. No one saw them and they hitched a lift with a lorry driver to Williamstown, the home of my foster parents. Fearing they might be caught, they knew they had to get as far away as possible. But my mother was desperate to see me first.

She did, and that same night, with the help of Mr O’Brien, she left for England.

My mother was free and eventually we were reunited. Sadly, she died seven years ago, but I will for ever be humbled by what she went through and how she never for one minute gave up on me. And it is this that eventually compelled me to sit down and piece together her story. This was my way of paying tribute to her.

For the Love of My Mother, by John Rodgers, is published by Headline Review

 

Children’s Rights Joins Statewide Advocates In Class Action Lawsuit on Behalf of Florida’s Most Vulnerable Children

Children’s Rights Joins Statewide Advocates In Class Action Lawsuit on Behalf of Florida’s Most Vulnerable Children
PRESS RELEASE

National and Local Advocacy Groups Join Legal Action Charging State With Violation of Civil Rights and Failure to Protect Children From Harm.

Children’s Rights, the national advocacy organization that had a failing government child welfare system put under a federal court receivership for violating foster children’s rights has joined forces with statewide advocates in a class action lawsuit that charges Florida’s foster care system violates due process rights for children in their care. The lawsuit was amended to expand legal choices on behalf of 23 foster children and all other children in Florida foster care. It seeks to stop ongoing violations of children’s rights and to ensure that the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF) adequately cares for and protects foster children in the state’s custody. The additional advocates join a team of children’s advocates and noted trial attorneys from all over Florida including Karen Gievers of Tallahassee, Ted Babbitt and Bob Montgomery of West Palm Beach and Wayne Hogan of Jacksonville.

in New York
The local advocates that have joined the lawsuit are Deborah Shroth of Florida Legal Services, Inc., a statewide nonprofit organization founded in 1973 and dedicated to ensuring that poor people have equal access to justice, Chris Zawisza of Nova Law School – Children First and Claudia Wright at “Gator Teamchild,” the University of Florida Fred Levin College of Law, Children’s Advocacy Program. The suit was filed on behalf of 23 named plaintiffs – children who have suffered serious physical and psychological harm while in the care of DCF. The lawsuit is filed on their behalf and on behalf of the approximately 15,000 foster care children who are currently dependent on DCF for their care and protection. The original counsels of the lawsuit were joined by Rose Firestein and Marcia Robinson Lowry of Children’s Rights, Daniel Freyberg, Leslie Goller of Brown, Terrell, Hogan, Deborah Shroth of Florida Legal Services, Roy Wasson, Claudia Wright of Gator Teamchild, University of Florida, Levin College of Law, and Christina A. Zawisza of Nova Law School – Children First. The Defendants in the suit include Governor Jeb Bush and Kathleen Kearney, Secretary of the Florida Department of Children and Families.

“DCF is a grossly mismanaged and overburdened child welfare system,” said Marcia Robinson Lowry, Executive Director of Children’s Rights, a national organization that is counsel in ten other foster care class actions around the country. “Florida’s failure to protect foster care children in DCF custody and provide them and their families with appropriate placements and services has endangered their lives. Children are often placed for long periods in overcrowded, temporary holding facilities without services or treatment, because DCF has nowhere else to place these children. Monitoring and supervision of children in DCF custody is frequently inadequate, so children in DCF custody often suffer abuse and neglect while in custody. The Florida child welfare system is in a state of crisis as severe as any we have seen.”

“The number of children in foster care in Florida keeps rising and the conditions they experience are deplorable,” said Chris Zawiswa of Nova Law School – Children First. “Many of the named plaintiffs have been brutalized, some have even been tortured. This case is a slam dunk on the facts.”

“There were 8,338 children in foster care in 1998, today there are 15,000 and DCF projects that number to rise to 18,000 by June 2001. Yet the resources to protect these children in foster care have not risen proportionately,” said Ms. Zawiswa. “For example, DCF says it needs 833 more out of home counselors, and yet in its budget, DCF requested funding for only 104 new counselors. Their attempt to reform has not only failed to improve children’s lives or improve the efficiency of the system, but has created deprivations that have worsened over time, resulting in dangerous and unlawful conditions that exist today.”

“We have seen first-hand the cruel indifference which the State of Florida exhibits to the safety and well-being of the children it places in its own custody,” said Deborah Shroth of Florida Legal Services. “Indifference which would clearly be labeled neglect if such conduct were perpetuated by the children’s own parents. Indifference which allows these children, in need of the protection of the State, to suffer emotional, physical and even sexual abuse while in the very homes intended to protect them.”

Key facts and claims in the amended lawsuit include:

OVERCROWDING

DCF’s continued overcrowding and inadequately supervised foster homes and other out-of-home care facilities expose children in DCF’s custody to the imminent risk of sexual and other abuse, neglect and other dangers while they remain in DCF’s care.

DCF has put children in foster care placements that were dangerous, abusive, neglectful, overcrowded, or wholly inappropriate to and incapable of meeting the children’s individual needs.

MOTEL PLACEMENT

In DCF’s budget document, they state there has been a significant increase in the need for out-of-home care placement options for children who have been identified as victims of child abuse or neglect. Over the next two years, DCF is expecting continued increases in the number of children requiring out-of-home placements. There has not been a parallel increase in the number of available foster homes resulting in overcrowded conditions in current foster homes and other related facilities. This has caused districts to pay for children and staff to be housed in motels.

RE-ENTRY

Based on DCF’s own data, during the period covering fourth quarter FY 98-99 through second quarter FY 99-00, only 23.9% of the children in a licensed home or group care facility who exited foster care did not re-enter foster care within 12 months. Thus, 76.1% of these children did re-enter government custody within 12 months, indicating their biological families posed an immediate danger to their safety, health or well being. DCF fell far short of Florida’s own standard that over 95% of the children should not re-enter foster care within 12 months, as well as the State’s interim goal that 70% of the children should not re-enter care.

LENGTH OF TIME IN CARE

These children have been retained in foster care for excessive amounts of time because they have failed to exercise professional judgment in identifying and implementing the reasonable steps needed to discharge these children to an appropriate permanent living arrangement with their biological family, through adoption or otherwise.

VISITATIONS

There are inadequate face-to-face visitations by social workers. As a result of excessive workloads, out-of-home counselors do not visit Plaintiffs and the putative class members in their placements with sufficient frequency in a manner that is adequate to ensure such children’s safety.

Children’s Rights works throughout the United States in partnership with national and local experts, advocates and government officials to document the needs of children in the care of child welfare systems. Children’s Rights helps develop realistic solutions and, where necessary, uses the power of litigation to ensure that reform takes place.

 

DONALDSON REPORT; WHERE ARE THE MOTHERS? 2006/12/06 Archive 95

DONALDSON REPORT; WHERE ARE THE MOTHERS?

by Origins USA

http://www.opednews.com

PRESS RELEASE….FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE…
Donaldson Paper Misses the Mark By Omitting the Evidence of Mothers.

Richmond, VA December 5, 2006 – The 11/19/06, E.B. Donaldson Adoption Institute (EBD) White Paper (Paper) entitled “Safeguarding the Rights and Well-Being of Birthparents in the Adoption Process” missed the mark when presenting the adoption industry’s failure to protect the rights of mothers by neglecting to include the people with the most experience– mothers — in their representation.

Absent in the Paper is acknowledgment that mothers’ legal and human rights protections were contravened. However, there are vast numbers of women, mothers who were denied due process, who have ample evidence of wrong-doing in the past in the records they have obtained from the agencies, hospitals, maternity homes, and physicians and their own testamentary evidence. The EBD White Paper fails to cite these women in their document.

Omitted from the resource list were writings by some of the foremost critics of adoption practice: Carole Anderson, Jean Paton, Rickie Solinger and Regina Kunzel. Ample historical evidence exists, in the writings of these researchers and others, that the adoption industry was aware of lifelong harm to surrendering mothers. The evidence presents a compelling case for the mistreatment of potentially surrendering mothers in the adoption process. The issues presented warrant attention and public inquiry.

Absent, too, was input regarding reform recommendations from mothers decades post-surrender, particularly the period in history, known as the Baby Scoop Era (post-WWII to Roe v. Wade). Millions of mothers were forced to surrender their infants during these years. Though the Paper primarily addresses current practices and mentions coercion, the Baby Scoop Era provides a clear picture of injustices to mothers and their children. More recent mothers, whose parental rights were contravened, the only mothers represented on the Donaldson panel, will often state that they are “satisfied” or “content” rather than risk antagonizing the adoptive parents of their child and threaten their contact privileges or compromise their own survival.

EBD fell short in their Paper because without the voices of the mothers who have lived for decades with the loss of their children, and without the voices of experience, no true and accurate picture of what changes to adoption practice are needed can be obtained.

***

For further information go to www.OriginsUSA.org

www.originsusa.org

Origins USA advocates for the preservation of natural families and, as a last resort, alternative systems of child care that respect the needs and dignity of both mother and child above permanent adoption separation. We provide support for people separated by adoption, fight coercive adoption practices, and educate the public and policy makers about the effects of adoption separation. A national organization, we are internationally affiliated with Origins Inc. ( NSW Australia), Origins Canada, and other Origins branches in those countries. OriginsUSA has also aligned with Tracker’s International in the U.K. and with Adoption Crossroads in the U.S.

 

Adoption Agencies being Sued 12/5/06 Archive 94

Thank u to Amy for this research.

birth parents suing adoption agencies

These women and men have fought back against some of the greediest, most corrupt adoption agencies in the country. Some of these agencies are finally getting the smack down.

In 1993, LDS services in Utah was sued by a birthmother. She was on thorazine when the agency attained her signature on the surrender, two days after the birth in 1967. When she was discharged, she did not remember the surrender or being drugged. she contacted the agency more than 30 times, expressing remorse and confusion over the loss of her son. The agency did not tell her about the drug nor did they tell her about her condition when she signed the surrender and she did not ask. The agency said that they could do nothing. In 1990, she and her son were reunited. The agency, through a clerical mistake, gave her a copy of her medical records. After two more years of letter writing with the agency and officials of the Mormon Church, she filed lawsuit. The Courts of Utah dismissed the case because the case was too late.

Recently a birthmother sued the adoptive parents for continued visitation with her adopted child. There was NO showing in any way that she was unfit or had acted inappropriately towards the child. It was one of the conditions upon her surrender. The judge ruled in her favor. She had maintained her relationship with her child until her efforts were frustrated by the department of social services and the adoptive mother.

The states have also intervened on the behalf of birth parents when out of state adoption agencies have preyed upon them while they were in vulnerable states. Ever heard of “Baby Tamia” Well the birth mother in this got caught into the snare of Utah’s adoption agencies. Utah has been called the “baby warehouse” capital recently. These cases were in 2005. Illinois stepped in on the behalf of the birth father, birth grandmother, and a birth mother. In the previously mentioned case, the birth mother saw the advertisement of A Cherished Child. She called them. The agency paid her $1,300 to fly her out to Utah. At the time of relinquishment, this birth mother was running a 102 degree fever and was suffering postpartum depression. The two witness required for a relinquishment were an agency representative and a hotel maid. In this family’s lawsuit, they allege that the birth mother was suffering from the loss of her grandmother, postpartum depression and had a fever at the time of relinquishment. Adoption agencies that were interviewed in a news story about this woman – said that they must protect mothers who may be fleeing abusive and broken homes. Utah’s leaders feel like the birth mother ought to have first choice in what should happen to their children. This adoption agency was busted a couple more times on this very issue. Illinois’s Attorney General put out a press release stating that the courts in Illinois found in favor of these families and ordered the children returned. They felt that the children involved were stolen from their families. This particular agency has been banned from doing business in Illinois. The adoption agency tried to force the adoption through but the adoptive family in Baby Tamia’s case was arrested for possession of drugs. Fortunately the Judge put a stop to it. Baby Tamia was returned to her home in 2005.

The Navajo Nation is also pursuing a lawsuit against LDS Family Services. The birth father in this case fought the adoption. This adoption agency failed to notify tribal officials and allow them to oversee the adoption proceedings as required under the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978. The lawsuit asks the federal court to put a hold on the adoption proceedings while it determines what the nation’s rights are in the face of “the natural Indian parent’s frustrated efforts to establish paternity under the lasw of the state of Utah.” When I went to the website for the tribe, I found many other articles just like this one. Utah sure seems to like to circumvent the rights of all involved when it comes to adoption. Utah’s state laws also like to dispose of the father’s rights. Ignore them in fact. More often than not they don’t even notify a birth father when his rights are being trampled on.

I have encountered cases just like these in many states. One in Michigan where the birth mother even admits to lying. Another in New Mexico again he was not even notified. Putative father registries are often used against a birth father to end his rights to his child than to actually help him retain his rights. Many of these adoption agencies lie in wait for a vulnerable woman to come along to violate her rights. They don’t allow for a woman to change her mind. I read another article where the birth mother realized that she named the wrong birth father. She corrected things by giving the real birth father the right to claim his children. She is now being punished because the adoption agency is suing her for the little bit of money they gave her for her expenses.

One more case that I just found a few minutes ago. I am just going to copy the story from the place that I found it. A Missouri jury recently awarded a birthmother $3 million after finding that an attorney misrepresented her. When the birthmother changed her mind after choosing a family, the attorney did not try to stop the adoption and actually worked with the parents to complete it. The adoption was completed in 1995, and the birthmother has since been granted visiting rights.

As I read more and more, these types of agencies and attorneys need to be shut down. They are violating the rights of all involved. They yell, curse, and humiliate a woman if she changes her mind. Geez if that isn’t coercion then I don’t know what is.

Agencies sued by adoptive parents (see Amy’s blog for all details)

Louise Wise has also been sued for wrongful adoption, by Martin and Phyllis Juman (NY)

In 1985 in West Virginia, James G. v. Caserta
In 1986 in Ohio, Burr v. Board of County Commissioners
In 1988 in California, Michael J. v. County of Los Angeles
In 1989 in Wisconsin, Meracle v. Children’s Service Society
In 1990 in Iowa, Engstrom v. State
In 1990 in Mississippi, Foster v. Bass
In 1991 Wolfords v. The Children’s Home Society of West Virginia (December)
(June 1993 it is finalized)
In 1992 in Illinois, Roe v. Catholic Charities
In 1994 in Pennsylvania, Gibbs v. Ernst
In 1995 in Massachusetts, Mohr v. Commonwealth
In 1995 in Rhode Island, Mallette v. Children’s Friend and Services
In Minnesota, M.H. and J.L.H. v. Caretas Family Services
In 1998 in Montana, Jackson v. State
In 1998 in Washington, Mckinney v. State
In 2003 in Texas, Gladney and two families.