This girl is the same age as my daughter.  I can’t imagine the hell her mother is going through, and I can’t imagine why she hasn’t been returned yet.  Surely, at this point, the people who adopted her are aware of the kidnapping and have been for some time.  This is a prime reason why adoption conjures so many negative connotations.  There is a profound lack of humanity here.  This girl is the victim of a kidnapping.  Why hasn’t she been returned voluntarily?  I don’t understand.

I have to ask myself, “What if this had been my daughter?”  Would people really question whether or not she should be returned to me after a kidnapping?  Or would it be different because I’m a white woman from the American midwest? 

If adoption is ever to be viewed as an ethical institution, there should never be any question as to the right course of action in a case such as this.

Just reading this story makes me want to throw up. As an adoptive parent this makes me very sad, but I agree with Jeanne; the child has to go back.

I agree she has to go back but it is not an easy thing to do.
Just imagine the child being disrupted with her second family once again. She is now at an age where she understands and has bonded with her new family.
Her birthfamily are strangers by now. Maybe she doesn’t speak the language, knows the culture.
All she knows is her current family.

I think the transition has to happen slowly. With the adoptive parents involved in her life for quite some time (or forever???).
No matter what, she is the one who will suffer a major tragedy once more.
They will all be in my prayers.

Here is an additional article in relation to this story.  It goes more into detail about how the biological mom searched for years for her daughter after she was kidnapped in 2006.  Now she is preparing a room for her and is excited to have her back home. 

Apparently the US does not have a history of carrying out foreign court orders to return adopted children to their home country.  But a Guatemalan official said that the US government is obligated under international treaties to return victims of human trafficking or irregular adoptions that have occurred within five years.

At this point, the US adoptive parents have not made any official statement as to their intentions.

This topic sparked a ton of discussion over on our Adoptive Families Facebook Page.

Brooke Allen Wesley My heart breaks for this couple and personally I don’t believe this child should suffer yet again nor should her adoptive parents !!!! Let her remain where she is !!

Tatiana Córdova de Paniagua Mixed feelings. She should stay with her adoptive parents, since they are the only parents she knows and because her future in Guatemala is not promising at all There is where I live) on the other hand, her bio mother has the right to have her back. She wasn’t the one who gave her away… Praying for an agreement between both the bio and adoptive parents.

Jennifer L. Gebhart Wow, thats really sad but is the exact reason why the Haigue (sp) is so important and its too bad that Guatemala didn’t sign it to prevent just this kind of thing from happening. I think she should stay with her adoptive parents and have open communication with her birth parents.

Adrian Montfort-Guy She should return to her birth parents - the heart break that all parents will be suffering is palpable, but at two she will recover from her experience. Yet again the reasons are highlighted for people to stick to domestic only adoptions

Natalie Hayes Ward I wonder if they refinalized or readopted in the courts in the US. If they did (and I am hoping they did) then hopefully the US will help them and back them up. Such a sad story!!

Misty Reim Williston Heart breaking….birthparents have missed so much. They need their baby back. So sad for the adoptive parents. So sad. But it seems like the right thing to do would be to return her to the ones she was taken from.

Anne Cavanaugh Sawan A nightmare.

Monique Bush Her Bio mother deserves to have her. I feel for the adoptive parents. Where she is from really has nothing to do with the case. Just because Jaycee got used to her condition didn’t mean her mother didn’t deserve her back. Im pretty sure that her adopted family is nowhere near the monsters the Garridos are. I was just comparing it for the sake of why I think the mother deserves her child back. Hopefully they can maintain a relationship.

Elizabeth Pierson Meta there is NO winners in this situation! hopefully they can come to some agreement and remain in contact! However I do not think that means all IA is bad and should be avoided!! Yes I say that knowing that there is a 3 year old in my house that is very much the light of my life…..as well as the rest of his family….Why did we travel half way around the world, to a Russian speaking country, live for a month in a hotel, come back to the us only to fly back 4 weeks later to bring him home?? Because Kazakhstan is where our son was!! For some their child is in the next state, time zone, etc. For US - it was Kazakhstan! Careful about dismissing an entire group of people!! All children deserve a family no matter where they are born.

Karen Jones My reaction, as both a biological and adoptive parent, is that I feel like I’ve taken a punch in the stomach. I feel such a sense of sadness and loss for all of the parents in this story.

Denise Cross Francis This is just an awful situation and the fear that most of us have when we started the adoption adventure. This poor child is old enough to be very aware of the situation and hopefully everyone considers the best interest of the CHILD.

Tonia Price She isn’t 2/3 now. This little girl is 7. She had been with her adoptive parents for 5 years. I think she should stay with her adoptive parents, but still have communication with her bio parents.

Jennifer L. Gebhart ‎@ Adrain Monfort-Guy. . .if you read the entire story, she is not two, she is 6 and won’t just get over it at that age. My husband and I adopted our daughter from China when she was just 12 months old. We did try domestic adoption, we are still licensed foster parents. Try working with judges in this country that time and time again send children back to alcholic and abusive parents just to see the child go back in the system 3 months later. After fostering for 2 years we just couldn’t do it anymore. We also tried to adopt an infant domestically. I don’t know about you but I don’t know many 15 year old girls that give their children up for adoption these days. Besides, China was where our daughter was and we had to go and get her. The day we went before the judge in China for us to become a forever family was our wedding anniversary. . . seems to me she was meant to be our little girl no matter where she just happened to be born.

Karla Serva-Patzner At 7yrs old now this will even cause more trauma in her life. I believe she came home in 2008 with parents. Its the only life she’s known. I feel so bad for her birth family too!!!!! Your right, where she comes from, makes no difference. She belongs there with them and this never should have happened…... BUT you have to do what’s in the best interest of the child now that the damage is done. All around, that would be to stay here if she’s well-bonded with her new family. Work out an arrangement with her birth family…. maybe they can be granted Visa’s to come here? I also hope to US does a DNA test first to make sure the claim is legit.

Karen Jones I understand some of the feelings here. But I can’t help thinking that if your child was kidnapped and gone for 5 years that you wouldn’t think for a minute that they shouldn’t be returned to you, right?

Kelly Marie Lewerenz Praying for peace for everyone,

Janna Davis Haik The child is much older now, and while it was a horrible thing that was done, for the well-being of the child I think it would be best to leave her with the adoptive parents and work out an open adoption agreement with the bio parents. If the child were still young, I would say return her to the bio parents. This is absolutely horrible for both the bio and adoptive parents!! I pray everything works out so that the child does not suffer! I know the bio and adoptive parents are heartbroken, but since so much time has passed and the child has been in a whole different country for so long, I think it would be best to leave her where she is and let her continue to thrive. In the end you the country and the bio parents have to think about the chid’s well-being and not their own heartbreak.

Heidi Spitzmueller Nesta Karen, my thoughts exactly! If your child was kidnapped and you found her five years later living with an adoptive family who had nothing to do with the kidnapping, would you be willing to let her stay with the adoptive parents? This is a horrible situation for all involved, and yes, it will be an incredibly hard adjustment for the little girl, but she should be returned to her parents. Hopefully they will agree to some sort of visitation or shared custody agreement so the little girl can still see her adoptive parents.

Kait Hirt Kettmann She belongs with her biological parents. People keep saying she needs to stay with her adoptive parents because she’s “older” but under those rules, no child should be adopted over a certain age. Older kids adapt too - as long as those caring for them help prepare them for what’s going to happen. As adoptive parents we should care enough about the ethics involved to look at a situation like this and say “Yes, it sucks. But the right thing to do, the ethical thing to do, is to recognize that this child was obtained illegally and therefore our adoption is not legal.”

Besides that, I cannot imagine looking at my child and having to some day tell her that I knew she had been kidnapped, I knew she had a loving mother who wanted her, and I kept her anyway. Poverty should never be a reason to remove a child from a parent that is competent.

Sharon Luck Their government has no jurisdiction here - child is a US citizen.

Katie Phillips I don’t think there is a “right” answer….it’s heartbreaking either way!

Karla Serva-Patzner I keep trying to put myself in all places, and just can’t. Her parents do deserve her back…. unfortunately the heart and head will sometimes tell you different things. Their government has no jurisdiction here like Sharon said, as we have none there. So it will be interesting to see what happens. Just praying for them all.

Adrian Montfort-Guy I feel terribly for the aParents, but they if they insist on keeping this child, then they are no better than the people who stole her and sold her to them. This is human trafficking at its very worst and underlines why international adoptions should be an exception, not a rule.

Imagine telling that child that you knew she was stolen and sold and you found out about it and did nothing - do you really think that child deserves to discover that her aParents cared more about their needs than hers or her bioparents?

Sharon Cerasoli it’s a horrible situation…however I guess I think that she should go back to Guatemala, as she was illegally taken…it’s awful for the family that adopted, and I hope that the Guatemalan family will let them have a role in the girl’s life..

Sharon Cerasoli one of the comments on here bothered me…it said that one of the reasons the child should stay in the US is that her future isn’t promising in Guatemala…well that is measuring things by our standards, and who are we to say that. I feel very uncomfortable with this type of paternalistic thinking and saw these kinds of comments often when we were in the process of adopting from China…that would not even be a factor in this case, IMO

Alison Mallett Hulett Oh so sad…I cannot even imagine…

Gretchen Dombrock Haynes This is a tragedy and while I feel for the adoptive parents, the child should be returned to her mother in Guatemala. It was not a legal adoption, even though the adoptive parents did not know it. Saying that she should remain in the only home she can remember is like saying that adoptive parents should not be able to adopt toddlers and older children because it is taking them away from their home and culture.

This is also why I am a strong supporter of adoption reform. This is yet another example of the consumerism of many current adoption practices. Instead of finding families for children who are truly in need, the money makes people find children for parents who want them and can afford the adoption fees. Even when there are not that many children available and criminals resort to fraud and kidnapping in order to make money.

Trisha Copeland Heartbreaking. I sympathize with all the victims: the child, her biological family and her adoptive family. I hope there’s a special place in hell for the people who facilitated this travesty.

Tatiana Córdova de Paniagua Sharon, I live in Guatemala, and I see everyday children that are exploited, abused, even killed just because our society is so corrupted that low income families, as her bioligical parents are, are forced by their own needs, to put them to work at really young ages. So, when I said that her future in Guatemala is not as promising, I said it from our day to day reality, not the US standards. I do pray for them to come to an agreement so that this innocent little girl gets what she needs: All of her parents, adoptive and biological, since none of them is to blame.

Denise Godwin I personally would totally consider letting my child stay with an adoptive parent if she was kidnapped from me and has lived with them for five years. If they had no idea she was kidnapped and was in a caring, loving home. I have seen what being moved from family to family has done to my daughter (fost/adopt) and I hope that I would put my feelings aside and do what is best for my daughter… As long as visitation and contact were established, she was safe and loved, I’d consider it. It is a horrific story. Heartbreaking on all accounts.

Cindy Morris Serfass Has anyone considered asking the child what she wants? She is 7 years old and I am sure she has feelings about what happens to her. As a foster parent I see firsthand that the uncertainty of their future is what causes a lot of stress and failure to bond in some of these kids.

Terrie Roberts Rauscher My heart breaks for all involved. This little girl is the one whom this is going to affect the most. May however this takes place make sure she is still a part of both of her families Her Mom In Guatemala needs to be able to see her child. Look how long she has looked yearned and no doubt cried for her child. I am an adoptive mom and I cannnot even imagine being in her adoptive parents postition at this time. God be with all of them.

Here is another update on this story.  In Guatemala, two women who were involved in the kidnapping  of this little girl were convicted and sentenced to 16 and 21 years in prison.  Their charges were for trafficking a stolen baby

Guatemalan officials hope that these convictions will help build the case that the young girl should be returned to her biological mother, in Guatemala. 

As of now, the US couple who adopted the girl from Guatemala have yet to comment and ask for privacy.

I too feel for all of the parents involved; but they are all adults, and this is should be about the rights of the child, period.

One of the biggest fallacies in the world is that your bio family is always best.  Tell it to the US foster kids who bounce back and forth from bio to foster family throughout their childhood.

I understand that neither the bio-family nor the adoptive family is to blame here, and those who are to blame are being punished.  But the rights and needs of the child must be paramount.  I think we can all agree that the minimum a child ought to be entitled to is adequate food, shelter and education, with healthcare and the expectation of personal safety right after that.  It isn’t about cultural superiority or money; it’s about the survival of the child!

If it can be established that the bio-family can provide adequate means by their country’s standards then maybe their claim should be honored.  At the very least she should be granted visitation and the adoptive parents should help to facilitate that as they can for the well being of the child.

But a well attached child of 7, who left Guatamala at 2 and now probably speaks only English and had little or no memory of her birth country and family will undoubtedly be traumatized by being abruptly returned to a situation to which she is not accustomed.  Find the least damaging solution to a horrible situation for the sake of the child, her needs should be the only ones considered by the courts.

Wish it were that way for our US foster kids, more of them would find permanent stable homes and sustain far less trauma if the children’s needs always trumped the goal of bio-family re-unification Children first.

Does anyone know what happened in this case?
Was she returned?

The last I heard, her adoptive family was trying to sort out the legalities and were trying to decide about a DNA test to verify that Karen was the kidnapped child.  The quote in the article about the DNA test boggles me. I can’t parse what it’s supposed to mean, other than that the adoptive parents disagree with the philosophy that underpins Guatemalan family law.

This link is from October: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/24/adoption-wars_n_1028665.html

I didn’t quite understand either. I was just wondering what happened. I guess when something happens it will be back in the news.

There is an entire website about this situation http://findingfernanda.com/2011/08/breaking-update-in-the-karen-abigail-case/ and if you go there, you will see that the Monahan’s, the adoptive parents, were grossly negligent in this case. As the adoptive parent of a 5 year old Guatemalan child, I am disgusted by how much the Monahan’s pursued a case that was clearly very problematic at best and ultimately illegal.
The DNA test was not a match and the Monahan’s were aware that there adoption agency was working on burying the results. You can read it all there but they made many choices that were wrong before Karen Abigail even left the country and they had many chances to stop this before it got this bad. The Monahan’s make all adoptive parents look horrible and there is no excuse for what they did. The girl needs to go back immediately and they should probably be brought up on charges.

From reading the link from ksunstar above, this particular case sounds clearly like a kidnapping and unfortunately the adoptive parents knew that things weren’t right in the adoption when the DNA results didn’t come out right and that the adoption agency was trying to hide the results (!)... they should not have continued in the adoption at that point, even if they were attached to the child as it was wrong.  So although I feel sorry for them that they found out that they were adopting a child whose adoption was not valid and they were probably attached to her at that point (and that would be hard), they were culpable in continuing and causing more heartbreak for the parents and the child, and ultimately themselves… they need to return the little girl to her family.  How awful that such a thing happened, and I’m glad the government is trying to get the little girl back!

Here’s another abducted child from Guatemala. Unfortunately, this little girl doesn’t get to go home.

http://fox4kc.com/2012/05/15/missouri-couple-to-keep-allegedly-kidnapped-child/

From details in the story, it appears Timothy and Jennifer Monahan of Liberty are now aware that they are in possession of an abducted child and have no interest in returning her to her legal and natural family.

Edit. Sorry, I was wrong. This is the SAME girl. She is NOT going home.

I totally disagree with CLB that the parents of a kidnapped child should have to prove that they can provide “adequate” (by whose standards?) support before their child is returned to them. This is their child. She was kidnapped. The people who are harboring her have simply no right to this child. That they know that this child was kidnapped, and that they are dragging out legal proceedings in order to be “the only parents the child has known” (a common tactic used by some illegal APs and of course their lawyers in order to draw things out) is simply disgusting.
What if your child—say, a child you had adopted—was kidnapped and a nice person like Donald Trump or San Walton happened to adopt them, seeing as how they wanted to build a family? Would it be okay if you had to prove that you could provide the same financial advantages before the child was returned to YOU? What if, given their financial and geographical advantages, they were able to draw the legal battle out for years—would you then be happy to have them have your kidnapped child because after all, so much time has passed?
I doubt it.
The sense of entitlement is just staggering.