Last month, cops arrested a woman trying to sell a 15-day-old girl; now, a mid-day investigation shows that despite past such cases against her, she ran a baby-selling racket from a Sion nursing home with impunity

Wanted in two human trafficking cases, 35-year-old Julia Fernandez had been brazenly running a baby-selling racket from her Sion-Koliwada nursing home for the past seven-eight years, the police said. She was caught last month selling a 15-day-old girl, after a Pune resident raised the red flag. The Mumbai Crime Branch is now probing whether she conducted abortions.

Julia faces four more human trafficking cases that are registered at Mankhurd police station, Wadala TT police station, Bandra police station and Mahatma Phule police station in Kalyan. On July 31, the Crime Branch of the Mumbai police department arrested her accomplice Shabana Shaikh, 30, too. One of Julia's victims is fighting a legal battle to get back her son, who was snatched and sold about a year back.

“Despite being most wanted in two human trafficking cases, she had been running her baby-selling shop from Sion-Koliwada for seven-eight years. Our team nabbed her on July 31 from her nursing home in Sion-Koliwada,” said an officer.

The rescued child is at Mahalaxmi-based Bal Asha Trust, a charitable organisation that helps abandoned and destitute children in Mumbai. “The baby is healthy. My nurses are taking care of her. We will also do further tests and initiate adoption process, if needed,” Vaishali Bhakte, a social worker from the trust, told mid-day.

On April 3rd 2020, the Child-Parent Security Act (CPSA) passed in the New York Legislature, meaning that commercial or “compensated” surrogacy is now legal in the state of New York. Similar laws are in place in 46 other US states. “Compensated surrogacy will be legal in New York in February of 2021!” read the Circle Surrogacy’s jubilant advert. But to those who consider commercial surrogacy to be dangerous and exploitative, the CPSA has effectively sanctioned the pimping of pregnancy; as demand for surrogate mothers increases, so does the likelihood that women will be coerced into the arrangement by abusive husbands or boyfriends. Not to mention the associated health risks for the woman giving birth.

Gestational surrogacy is where the egg and a sperm (the embryo) are formed from material belonging to either “commissioning parents,” or from egg and sperm donors. The embryo is then transferred into a mother who carries the baby to term for the parents. The New York law allows for commercial gestational surrogacy in which the birth mother has not contributed any of her own genetic material and for commissioning parents to be named on the birth certificate. Under this law, if the birth mother changes her mind and wishes to keep the child, she will have no legal right to do so. It also requires that the baby produced from a surrogate pregnancy be born in New York, but not that the surrogate mother is a New York resident.

Traditional surrogacy (also known as partial surrogacy) involves the surrogate’s egg being fertilised with the sperm of the intended father. This remains illegal in NYC, a legacy of the 1986 Baby M case, where a surrogate mother refused to give up her baby and fled to Florida. She fought and lost a custody fight against the couple who had contracted to pay her $10,000 to bear the child. A task force was appointed in the wake of this case, resulting in traditional surrogacy and commercial surrogacy being banned in 1992. Traditional surrogacy remains against US law but the 2020 CPSA overturned the ban on commercial surrogacy in New York state.

The campaign to legalise surrogacy in New York is a decade old. Versions of the legislation were first introduced in 2012 and again in 2017. Intended parents, lawyers seeking to profit from dealing with surrogacy cases, and of course the clinics and agencies, all argued that because other states had legalised commercial surrogacy, New York should follow suit. Others argued it was discriminatory to “prevent gay couples from having the same right to fertility treatment as heterosexuals.” I heard from one lesbian couple in the US that they couldn’t agree on which one would carry the baby so they decided to “outsource the pregnancy.”

Commercial surrogacy is banned in the UK, but there are regular attempts by industry profiteers to introduce it. A number of UK couples and individuals travel to Ukraine where it is legal, but it is impossible to gage exact figures. In Ukraine, more than 2,000 children are born through surrogacy every year. The majority of “commissioning parents” are foreign, heterosexual couples. During Covid lockdown and the subsequent war, business continued and clinics merely “stored” the babies until intended parents were able to travel to collect them. Surrogate mothers continued to be sourced across the country and would give birth in collective housing facilities.

A New York adoption agency deliberately split up infant twins in the 1960s as part of a controversial study. Melissa Hogenboom tracks down some of those involved to find out why they are still searching for answers about this intrusive experiment.

Kathy Seckler was 16 years old when she made an unexpected discovery that changed her life completely – she had an identical twin sister. It was 4 September 1977 – she recalls with utmost clarity, her voice wobbling only slightly – when a friend told her that she resembled a girl she knew called Lori Pritzl, and asked if she was adopted. Seckler's birthday was the same date as Pritzl's and the two girls looked exactly the same. Seckler had known she was adopted since a young age, enjoying a happy and loved upbringing, but she then learned that Pritzl had also been adopted from the same agency as her.

The girls immediately spoke on the phone and realised their friend's suspicions must have been true – that they were twins. Seckler recalls breaking down in tears when she met her twin sister for the first time. "I saw Lori crossing the street… a big smile on her face," she says. "Then we hugged. It was quite an experience… I felt less alone. Being an adopted child, I always felt different… I felt like, 'Wow, I have a comrade there'."

They were both smokers, had similar artistic interests like dancing and drawing, and both liked music. "It was surreal," says Pritzl. "I felt like I was staring at myself in the mirror."

They could have found out earlier – their similarity to each other had been pointed out previously by acquaintances who knew both families. Pritzl had shrugged it off – doesn't everyone occasionally hear that they look like someone else? However, the girls lived about 15 miles (24km) from each other and they had family friends in common. Unbeknownst to both girls, their parents had known about the other twin for about a decade, but had been told to keep it a secret.

When Cristina Prisco, 42, was growing up as an adopted only child in the Bronx, she always had a clear idea of where she came from — or so she thought.

“There wasn’t really a day that went by that I didn’t think about where I was born and how my story started,” Prisco told The Post exclusively.

Her supposed origin story, long accepted by Prisco and her adoptive parents, was that she had been born to a poor woman in Chile. The birth mother couldn’t afford to raise her baby herself, so she gave Cristina up to a Catholic orphanage.

Prisco’s adoptive father, Benito Zagaglia, travelled to Chile in the spring of 1980, using an Italian passport to enter the country under Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship.

He brought his baby home in May of 1980, holding her close the entire 11 hour flight from Chile to New York City where her adoptive mother Ann Marie Zagaglia anxiously awaited. Little did the newly completed family know that their baby was a victim of child trafficking.

Some parents were also selling their biological children due to their financial condition, and awareness should be created against such practices, he said.

VIJAYAWADA: The process for adopting children should be made easier to check child trafficking, senior advocate and amicus curiae P Sri Raghuram submitted before the High Court of Andhra Pradesh on Tuesday.

Raghuram, appointed as amicus curiae to assist the court in a case related to the sale of infants and human trafficking, also noted the cumbersome adoption procedure in the country. Childless couples, wishing to adopt, have been seeking alternatives to avoid the tedious process.

Some parents were also selling their biological children due to their financial condition, and awareness should be created against such practices, he said. The amicus curiae also opined that child trafficking could be prevented if the police acted swiftly on any complaint related to missing of child.

The high court has taken suo motu cognisance of two separate media on child trafficking as public interest litigations. When the PILs came up for hearing on Tuesday, the amicus curiae opined that ASHA and anganwadi workers should track the expectant mother right from her pregnancy to deliver better results. Raghuram sought more time to seek the views of stakeholders and NGOs concerned to get more details on sale of infants and human trafficking.

District magistrates need to be given training to give decisions on adoption, it added.

NEW DELHI: It is not appropriate for an administrative authority, instead of a judicial body, to issue adoption orders, a Parliamentary panel has noted. The Standing Committee’s views are at variance with the Juvenile Justice Amendment Act, 2021, which was amended to empower district magistrates (DMs) to issue adoption orders. Before this, the power to issue adoption orders was vested in the judiciary.

It was in July last year that the Parliament passed the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Amendment Bill, 2021. The amendment also entrusts the DM to ensure that childcare institutions comply with the provisions of the Act.

However, the Standing Committee, which tabled its recommendations recently on ‘Guardianship and Adoption Laws’ felt that judges have competence and experience to determine whether adoption is in the best interest of the child.

The panel, headed by BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi, said since the new system is yet to be tried and tested, the Committee recommends that training should be imparted to DMs, ADMs and divisional commissioners in this regard. It also told the Ministry of Women and Child Development to review the functioning of the new system and present a report to the Committee.

We launched an investigation into allegations of possible criminality involving Mother and Baby Institutions, Magdalene Laundries and Workhouses on 6th October 2021. Since then, we have received reports from a number of people including mothers who gave birth in these institutions, those who were adopted from different named institutions, people who worked there, and residents. We are pleased that people are having the confidence after all these years to come forward, however we believe there are still people out there who have suffered and not yet made a report.

Help and support available

If you come forward, you will speak with a specialist detective from our Historic Child Abuse Unit within our Public Protection Branch, and will be offered the opportunity to have your account recorded so that a criminal investigation can take place. You will also be offered to be signposted to other services for help and support.

How do I make a report to Police?

If you have been the victim of non-recent abuse or any criminal act arising out of these institutions, or have any information likely to assist an investigation into a criminal act committed, please come forward and report this to us. We care about what you have to say, will listen and support you, and will act to keep you and others safe

KANPUR: Two brothers have reportedly been arrested and sent straight to jail for allegedly raping their sixteen-year-old "adopted" sister in Uttar Pradesh's Kanpur district.

As per reports, during police investigations, it came to notice that the parents of the accused had illegally adopted the victim from the orphanage in 2013 but no documents related to it have been shown. The accused brothers had also reportedly made an obscene video of the minor.

The girl used to receive threats from both of her stepbrothers that they would go viral with the footage. The victim was frequently subjected to rape attempts through extortion.

The victim informed the authorities that she was from the Banda district, that her mother had died in 2013, and that her father had abandoned his three daughters in the care of their mother.

Her maternal relatives placed the child in an orphanage.

The Supreme Court said that a woman's right to avail maternity leave cannot be taken away, if she had earlier availed child care leave for her non-biological kids

The Supreme Court on Tuesday said that a woman's right to avail maternity leave cannot be taken away, if she had earlier availed child care leave for her non-biological kids.

A bench headed by Justice D.Y. Chandrachud said the fact that the woman was given child care leave cannot be used to disentitle her rights under Central Civil Services Rules (CCS Rules). The bench, also comprising justice A.S. Bopanna, added the object and intent of the grant of maternity leave would be defeated.

The bench said the provisions of CCS Rules regarding maternity leave have to be interpreted in line with the object and intent of the Maternity Benefit Act. The petitioner's two children were from husband's previous marriage.

The petitioner is working as a nurse at the Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh (PGIMER), and she was denied maternity leave for her biological child. The petitioner was told that she had already availed such leave for two of her elder kids.

'It's a story written in heaven,' says the mom of four

BY LOUISE CHAMBERS TIMEAUGUST 17, 2022

After adopting an orphaned boy who had escaped slavery in Ethiopia, a Tennessee mombegan dreaming of a girl child. Coming across a photo of a 7-year-old orphan in need proved her dream had been a premonition, but after traveling back to Ethiopia to adopt the child, a battle began.

The girl, named Favor, was withheld, and feared at risk of being fostered by a known satanist. Mom-of-four Missy Maxwell Worton, of Franklin, refused to leave Ethiopia without her daughter; bolstered by faith, she eventually succeeded.

“It’s a story written in heaven,” Missy told The Epoch Times. “We saw a need. We went and we rescued Favor from a situation that was going to steal her destiny, possibly her life if she had gotten into this man’s hands.