Two US citizens face criminal charges for participating in an adoption scam that separated Polish and American children from their families to be adopted by people in the United States, the Justice Department said in a press release on Monday
WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 17th August, 2020) Two US citizens face criminal charges for participating in an adoption scam that separated Polish and American children from their families to be adopted by people in the United States, the Justice Department said in a press release on Monday.
"The defendants allegedly resorted to bribery and fraud to engage in an international criminal adoption scheme that took children from their home countries in Uganda and Poland without properly determining whether they were actually orphaned," the release said.
In the Uganda scheme, Debra Parris and Dorah Mirembe were each charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and conspiracy to commit visa fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud and money laundering, the release said.
Parris and Mirembe, paid bribes to social workers, judges and court registrars to allow adoptions by Americans to proceed, the release added.
In a separate press release, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said parents in Uganda were persuaded to give up their children, possibly without parents knowing the children would be sent to the United States.
Officials promised that the "children would be moved to Kampala to further their education. American prospective adoptive parents then traveled to Uganda to adopt children from an unlicensed children's home in Kampala," Pompeo said.
Earlier on Monday, the Treasury Department sanctioned four Ugandans, including two judges, in connection with that scheme.
The Polish case involves two children, one of whom Parris attempted to place with her relatives while covering up physical abuse of the child, according to the Justice Department.
