Family Forum / Parenting / Adoption / February 2006

     SPECIAL REPORT HOPE & RISK: Money, hope lost in failed adoptions

     By Dan Gearino
     PART III OF IV

     SIOUX CITY, Iowa - Becky and Jason Heikkila were going to adopt a baby
boy. They traveled to New Mexico for his birth and stayed there for three
days. They named him, held him and planned for their lives with him.

     But this joyful time turned to heartbreak when the baby's mother
decided to back out of the adoption plan. The mother - whose husband was in
jail and who also had an on-again-off-again boyfriend - decided to raise the
child herself.

     The Heikkilas were emotionally wrecked as they returned home to
Canton, S.D., a small town that borders the northwest corner of Iowa. They
were also financially wrecked, having spent nearly $20,000 in nonrefundable
adoption expenses, which was almost a year's salary in Becky's job as a
school librarian.

     "I was shocked and panicked," Heikkila said.

     In the months that followed, they replayed the events in their minds.
They say they began to question if they had been victims of an adoption
business that cared more about getting their money than it cared about
making a good match between a mother and adoptive parents.

     This story, which took place two years ago, is not an isolated case,
according to interviews with other prospective adoptive parents.

     The Heikkilas arranged their adoption through Adoption Insight, based
in Holtville, Calif., and worked directly with Laurie Aragon, the company's
owner and founder. Aragon's office is a two-hour drive east of San Diego and
10 miles north of the Mexican border, yet her company is right in the middle
of the Iowa adoption industry.

     Adoption Insight matches prospective adoptive parents with pregnant
women planning for adoption. This kind of business, called an adoption
facilitator, often uses Web sites and nationwide classified advertising to
reach customers all over the country.

     "I've been in business since 1999. I do a lot of adoptions. I have a
lot of satisfied clients," Aragon said in a telephone interview.

     Adoption attorney Mark McDermott of Maryland, former president of the
American Academy of Adoption Attorneys, warns that facilitators are
virtually unregulated, with little federal oversight and a patchwork of
state laws.

     "They're just people who aren't licensed or regulated by anybody. They
just hang up a shingle saying 'I'm an adoption facilitator.' They're real
bad news," he said.

     Iowa is one of roughly a dozen states that have no rules specifically
limiting adoption advertising or the use of facilitators, according to the
National Adoption Information Clearinghouse, part of the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services

     In reports published Sunday and Monday, the Quad-City Times Des Moines
Bureau examined a pattern of adoptions in Sioux City, in which pregnant
women relocated from across the country to place their children for adoption
in Iowa, often to parents from other states.

     Sioux City adoption attorney Maxine Buckmeier represented several of
the adoptive parents, who underwrite the pregnant women's living expenses.
But she has outside help in recruiting the pregnant women and the adoptive
families, say prospective adoptive parents.

     They say some of that help comes from Aragon and other facilitators.

     Impatience leads to pain

     Heikkila, 33, says she selected Adoption Insight because the company
seemed to be able to make adoptions happen much faster than traditional
adoption agencies.

     She and her husband had previously adopted through a nonprofit agency.
They had to wait a year for the agency to locate a mother and make the
match. She says she later learned that this is a normal wait time when
adopting a newborn through an agency.

     Heikkila saw that Adoption Insight - which before 2004 was called
Adoption Wise - had dozens of mothers willing to place a child for adoption.
Heikkila recalls that she felt comfortable with Aragon, who was friendly and
appeared to be one of the only people working at the company.

     Within a few months, Aragon helped match them with a mother in
Colorado who was planning to move to New Mexico, Heikkila says. One of the
conditions of the match was that the Heikkilas would have to pay the mother's
living expenses in New Mexico, including rent, food and other essentials.
The prospective adoptive parents say they later learned that these payments
are illegal in some states, such as Delaware, but are legal in many others,
including New Mexico and Iowa.

     The Heikkilas talked to the mother several times a week and visited
her over Easter break that year, months before she gave birth. The mother
continued to live in the apartment for at least three weeks after she had
decided to parent the child herself, with the rent for that time paid in
advance by the Heikkilas.

     In hindsight, Becky Heikkila feels like the mother cared more about
the living expenses than she cared about the adoption.

     After the New Mexico adoption fell through for the Heikkilas, they say
Aragon was undeterred. She almost immediately suggested the couple get
matched with a woman who was living in a Sioux City apartment. The Heikkilas
say Aragon told them Buckmeier, the Sioux City attorney, would take care of
the details. This would cost up to $10,000 more than they had already spent.

     "By that time, I said, 'Not on your life,' " Heikkila said.

     Buckmeier says she only vaguely recalls this situation because the
Heikkilas never made a match with the expectant mother in Sioux City. She
says the pregnant woman was a long-term Sioux City resident who explored
matches with several couples.

     Soon after, Becky Heikkila says she asked Adoption Insight for a
refund of the initial $7,000 fee and threatened to sue. Heikkila says Aragon
eventually mailed a $3,500 refund, which reduced the overall financial loss
to about $16,400.

     When they adopted again, it was through a nonprofit agency that
specializes in international adoptions.

     Aragon spoke to a reporter three weeks ago, cutting off the
conversation after a few minutes because of other calls coming in. She says
she could "write a whole book" about the Heikkilas' experience.

     She says she handles about 30 adoptions per year, most of which go
well.

     Aragon asked that any future questions be submitted by e-mail. In
reply to e-mailed questions, she wrote that 90 percent of the matches she
makes result in an adoption. She wrote that the Heikkilas chose to make the
match with the woman in New Mexico and could have backed out at any point if
they had concerns.

     'It just seemed wrong'

     In the two years since the experience in New Mexico, the Heikkilas
have made contact with other adoptive parents who dealt with Adoption
Insight. They found their story was not unique.

     A Wisconsin woman agreed to be interviewed as long as her name would
not be printed. She is afraid that being identified will make other adoption
professionals reluctant to work with her.

     She and her husband went through two failed adoptions with Adoption
Insight in the span of about a month. Each time, she and her husband took
time off from work and traveled long distances, excited to finally adopt.
And each time, they headed home emotionally devastated because the mother
had decided to keep the baby.

     Within days of the second failed adoption, the Wisconsin woman was
offered a third situation, this one in Sioux City, that she was told would
be handled by Buckmeier. She was told that a mother would be moving from the
west to live in a Sioux City apartment building for the several months
before giving birth.

     "The whole thing about them relocating this mother, it just seemed
suspicious to me. Why would they do that and why would they support her? It
just seemed wrong," she said.

     Frustrated and seeing red flags everywhere, the prospective adoptive
mother rejected the Sioux City situation and severed her ties with Aragon.
She says she demanded a refund of the $5,000 initial fee she had paid to
Aragon, and continued to make the demand for about a year before getting a
check for $3,500.

     A reporter made contact with three other Adoption Insight customers,
only one of whom says she would recommend the company.

     Traci Johnston, 30, of Des Moines, praises Adoption Insight for the
way it handled her adoption last year. She says the adoption was handled by
Buckmeier and involved a mother who was a long-term Sioux City resident.

     Johnston, a special-education teacher, says Aragon was "so kind" and
Buckmeier "handled everything professionally." She estimates that she and
her husband spent about $25,000 on the adoption, which includes several
months of living expenses.

     She says the wait for the adoption was only two months, compared to a
two-year wait she had been told to expect from a nonprofit agency.

     Buckmeier, who helped set up the interview with Johnston, says
Adoption Insight does a great job.

     "When the situation doesn't work out, (prospective adoptive parents)
feel the need to blame somebody," she said.

     Risks can be reduced

     There are no reliable statistics about how often mothers of newborns
make an adoption plan then decide after the birth to parent the baby
themselves. Iowa City adoption attorney Lori Klockau, who was not involved
with any of the cases described in this report, says such last-minute
changes of heart are rare. She can recall only three in her 14-year career.

     A November survey by Adoptive Families magazine found that 29 percent
of readers polled had a domestic adoption fail - at any point, including
after the birth - before one succeeded.

     Klockau says one way to reduce the risk of a failed adoption is to
screen out expectant mothers who aren't serious about adoption, don't
understand the process, or appear mainly interested in getting money from
the prospective adoptive parents. She says adoption professionals should
inform clients about the level of financial and emotional risk in a
situation.

     "Adoptive parents have to be careful because there are pregnant women
out there (who) really don't have any intention of giving their child up for
adoption," Klockau said.

     She says she has never worked with Adoption Insight and doesn't have
any impression of the company's reputation.

      'We provide solutions'

     So who is Laurie Aragon? According to her Web site, she is an adoptive
parent and certified nursing assistant who decided to open a nonprofit
adoption consultancy in 1999 called Adoption Wise.

     "I believe adoption should be as affordable as giving birth to your
own babies and can be a wonderful experience for both the adoptive families
and birth parents," she writes in a message her Web site indicates was
posted in June 2003.

     Six months later, she posted a message on the site that she was
changing the company to for-profit status and the name to Adoption Insight.

     An Internet search of common phrases in Adoption Insight ads turned up
recent examples in Arkansas, California, Colorado and Pennsylvania. They all
list the same toll-free number, which connects to a 24-hour answering
service in Holtville.

     "Pregnant and alone?" begins an ad from a free newspaper in Monmouth,
Ill. "We can help! We provide solutions, not judgment. Free confidential
consultation. Relocation and financial assistance available. Adoption
Insight."

     Aragon argues that she runs a good business and says she won't let her
critics get her down.

     "The sad thing is, in adoption, the only people who complain are the
people who really have no reason or right to complain," she said in the
phone interview.

     Consumers get little help

     Prospective adoptive parents have few places to go to check on the
claims made by facilitators and almost no recourse when things go wrong.

     In California, home to several of the most active facilitators, just
about anybody can enter the business and there is no statewide oversight.

     "Essentially, they are required to have a business license, publish a
list of their services and (have a) $10,000 bond before they hang a
shingle," said Alex Valdez Jr., spokesman for the California Department of
Social Services.

     Fraud complaints in California are filed with the district attorney in
the company's home county. The exceptions are some rural counties, such as
the one that includes Holtville, Calif., where the district attorney only
gets involved after the local Chamber of Commerce or Better Business Bureau
have said a complaint has merit.

     "A report would be made and then, at that time, it would be brought
over to our office for prosecution," said Saul Sanabria, administrative
analyst in the district attorney's office that serves Holtville.

     The Better Business Bureau, a group run by businesses, has a record of
two complaints against Adoption Insight. The bureau Web site shows that the
complaints were resolved by giving the customers partial refunds.

     Aragon says that the small number of complaints shows that most of her
customers are happy with her work.

     In Iowa, there are no laws specifically regulating the conduct of
facilitators, says a spokesman for the Iowa Attorney General's Office.

     adoption advertising

     An Iowa-based company, One True Gift Adoptions, is an adoption service
provider with a nationwide reach.

     The state-licensed agency, which lists a mailing address in Waukee,
advertises in many of the same phone books and newspapers as Adoption
Insight.

     One True Gift co-founder Patricia Gerlitz says customers can be
confident of what they're getting with a licensed agency - as opposed to a
facilitator - because she says the state has offered its seal of approval.

     She says her agency will do about 125 adoptions this year with average
fees that are usually in the $10,000 to $30,000 range, depending on where
the mother lives and whether living expenses are being paid. Roughly half of
the placements are with mothers or adoptive parents in Iowa.

     She estimates that advertising is more than half of her cost of doing
business.

     "To be a national firm is a huge undertaking. It's a
half-million-dollar investment in advertising every year," Gerlitz said.

     One thing her agency avoids is relocation of mothers.

     - Dan Gearino

     About this series: The Quad-City Times Des Moines Bureau looks at the
opportunities and risks of infant adoption through the stories of mothers,
adoptive parents and adoption professionals.

     Sunday: Adoption is changing, whether the people involved are ready or
not. Also, a look at a Sioux City, Iowa, apartment building and its role in
the national market for adoptions.

     Monday: The story of one mother who relocated to Iowa

     to place her child for adoption,

     and how her trip went wrong.

     TODAY: Adoptive parents from across the Midwest describe the risks of
working with an adoption facilitator.

     Wednesday: Experts and

     adoptive parents suggest ways to have a successful adoption.

     PARTICIPATE: Tell us your adoption story. Reporter Dan Gearino can be
reached at (515) 243-0138 or dan.gearino@lee.net.