Posted on 12/17/2006 8:56:55 AM PST by Graybeard58
As far as Walter Klein is concerned, the 6- and 2-year-old girls he and his ex-girlfriend flew to China to adopt over the last four years are his daughters.
He helped raise them. He says he's the one they called "Da!" the last time they threw their arms around him in an emotional 10-minute reunion in their mom's driveway in September. And he is the one who will be heartbroken if he doesn't see them this Christmas.
But his name is nowhere on the adoption papers. The adoption agencies told him and his ex-girlfriend it would be easier for a single woman to adopt than for an unmarried couple, he said.
So the question confronting a Cook County judge is whether Klein has a legal leg to stand on in seeking visitation rights with the girls.
'Just a guy I dated' "He's not your father," Susan Joncha shouted to the girls as they ran to him Sept. 30 in her driveway, Klein said. His 6-year-old was hugging him, his 2-year-old frozen next to her mom, wanting to run to him but not wanting to disobey her mom who had ordered her to stop, Klein said. When Klein turned to leave, the 2-year-old ran to him and grabbed his leg, he said.
"His name is Walter. He's just a guy I dated. Call him 'Walter.' Don't call him 'Da,' " Joncha corrected the girls, according to Klein.
Turning to Klein, she said, "You will never see these girls again. I will leave the country if I have to," Klein said. That was the older girl's sixth birthday, the last time he has seen them.
"'Da' is all she could pronounce when she first came from China," Klein said of the 6-year-old girl.
Father's Day cards he attached to his lawsuit have the last "d" on the cards scratched out. The sentiments Klein said Joncha wrote on the girls' behalf next to a heart-surrounded Snoopy say "You are the best Da in the whole world."
Christmases in Tucson where Klein, Joncha and the girls used to live were spent at home with Klein helping set up the girls' gifts under the tree. Last year Joncha asked him to leave the house just before Christmas but allowed him to come back and spend Christmas Day with the girls, he said.
"All I want for Christmas is to see my children," Klein said.
On Aug. 17, Joncha called Klein and told him, "You're not their father anymore. You're just a guy I dated," the lawsuit said. She told him he would not see the children again and she would be taking the children to a counselor to explain to them that Walter was not their father.
Joncha could not be reached for comment and her attorney declined to respond to questions.
Klein, 56, the former owner of the Vic Theatre, started dating Joncha, 52, a teacher, in 1992. In 2001, he sold the Vic and they moved to Tucson, where he bought a home. They traveled to China together and Joncha adopted the first girl -- who was 2 years old, and moved back to Tucson, where they lived together as man and wife, or mom and dad, Klein said. Klein footed all the bills for the trip and the adoption, according to documents he attached to his lawsuit.
Didn't want to jinx adoption Why didn't they marry? Klein was married once before and did not like it, he said. He has two adult children from that marriage.
Why didn't he sign the adoption papers? The adoption firm, based in Wheaton, told him a single woman stood a better chance of adopting a child in China than an unmarried couple, he said. Also, the Chinese authorities ask a lot of questions about adoptive parents' health. He had just had a heart bypass and didn't want to jinx the adoption, he said.
In 2005, they flew back to China to adopt a little sister for their girl, he said. They moved back to Tucson but then moved back to Chicago soon afterward, according to the lawsuit. They broke up just before Christmas.
Though Klein's name is not on any of the adoption papers, his attorney, Enrico J. Mirabelli, thinks he has a good chance to get visitation rights for Klein if a judge considers "the best interests of the children," he said.
Mirabelli helped push this area of the law in an earlier case in which his client said her ex-boyfriend agreed to support her becoming pregnant through in vitro fertilization, but then refused to help support the children after they were born. The court ruled Mirabelli's client could bring a case even though the ex-boyfriend never signed a contract. But he died six days before the verdict, Mirabelli said.
Judge Leida Santiago will hear the case Wednesday.
Real nice lady. Just the kind that should be raising kids... Poor babies, saddled with that heartless, selfish female for a mother.
I couldn't imagine having kids when I was over 50 years old.
China does not permit an unmarried couple to apply to adopt children -- only married couples and singles may apply (and singles will not be allowed to apply after May 2007).
I suspect that Ms. Joncha is the applicant on the paperwork for both the Chinese government and the US Citizenship & Immigration Services. I further suspect that the only reference to Mr. Klein is in the homestudy since China requires information on all adults living in the home.
I would be willing to bet if she wanted child support from this guy there would be no problem with calling him the adoptive father.
China is closing adoptions to single women?
If so then people like Ms Joncha are probably a big part of the reason China is closing off adoptions to single women. The acts of one selfish person can ripple across many lives.
Then, they get old and sick when their new kids are into their teens and don't get to finish the doing over. Both sets of kids get short-changed.
They might make the news--like the sixty-yr-old moms who get weird docs to get their burnt-out factories running again. But the do-over dad is everyday and banal.
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