De Heerenveensche koerier : onafhankelijk dagblad voor Midden-Zuid-Oost-Friesland en Noord-Over?ssel
04-12-1952
Infant trade discovered Baby exports from Europe to America
NEW YORK (P.A.). Florida police have unmasked and locked up a gangster gang whose job it was to establish and maintain a profitable trade in infants. For some time now, the attention of the American detectives had been drawn to advertisements placed in the major American newspapers, in which prospective mothers were asked to contact a certain address in person (or by telephone). Childless couples who wanted to adopt a baby could also report to the address in Florida.
The police there obtained information indicating that an international organization of criminals was involved in the trafficking of infants. This trade already started in 1919, but took off after the Second World War, even if it was alarming. The gang of criminals, which is especially concerned with this kind of crime, finds some support in public opinion, which has a Puritan aversion to children born out of wedlock and to unmarried mothers. Because that has more or less encouraged this form of crime. It has been found that babies from Europe are smuggled into the US and sold there to the highest bidder. Illegal childless couples take in babies—whose parents are unknown, or want to stay that—for which, of course, a lot of money has to be paid.