Posted on 10/02/2002 5:08:14 PM PDT by madfly
As Texas state inspectors reviewed files Tuesday during a surprise office visit, the operators of AAA-Alamo Adoption Agency denied buying babies or targeting pregnant women in Mexico."We do not buy babies from anyone. We do not solicit clients from Mexico. We cannot work with clients who are not in this country," said Juanita Gray, an agency worker and daughter of co-owner Eleanor Gray.
In their first interview since the Sept. 15 arrest of an agency employee in Laredo on charges of baby-buying and smuggling undocumented immigrants, the Grays and their attorney Dan Bass said they are the victims of a "witch hunt."
"There has been a complete lack of good faith on the part of the Department of Protective and Regulatory Services as far as telling us what regulations we are charged with violating," Bass said.
On Tuesday, Bass sent a blistering seven-page letter to officials of the protective services agency, which on Sept. 23 suspended AAA-Alamo for 10 days, while it reviews allegations raised in Laredo.
"The information we have strongly points to foul play by members of the hospitals and the Mexican Consul, who have schemed to frustrate the adoptions of children born to Mexican citizens," Bass wrote.
According to Bass and the Grays, the probe was begun by the Mexican Consulate in Laredo, whose employees, they claim, browbeat Mexican mothers to keep their babies and make up incriminating stories about the agency.
"The Mexican Consulate threatened the ladies and told them, 'If you place these babies for adoption, you'll go to jail,'" Eleanor Gray said.
"We're not afraid. We didn't do anything wrong," she said.
However, Daniel Hernandez Joseph, the Mexican consul general in Laredo, said his office became involved only after receiving pleas in August from two young Mexicans who wanted to keep their newborns.
He said that after dealing with these two AAA-Alamo clients, both of whom said they had been smuggled illegally into Texas, he eventually spoke to three others.
"Once we saw what seemed to be a pattern, we began watching for Mexican nationals in similar circumstances, but we weren't standing around in hospitals," he said.
He said some of the women he found wanted to keep their babies, while others wanted to give them up, but his office didn't try to influence any of them.
"Of course we don't try and persuade them to keep their babies," he said.
On Tuesday, while the Grays and Bass talked in the office kitchen, three state regulators were busy nearby, inspecting agency files.
Protective services spokesman Geoffrey Wool said the surprise visit was a continuation of a review into AAA-Alamo that was suspended weeks ago at the request of law enforcement officials in Laredo.
"They are there continuing the investigation we began on Aug. 15. Since the emergency suspension is in effect, we can go back in and finish our investigation," he said.
According to state and federal law enforcement officials, an employee of AAA-Alamo ran a baby-buying scheme in Laredo that included smuggling pregnant Mexican women across the Rio Grande on inner tubes and paying them after they relinquished their parental rights.
One AAA-Alamo employee, Maria Dolores Bondoc, 53, was charged. She was released on bond Friday after spending nine days behind bars in Laredo.
Late last week, federal charges against Bondoc of smuggling undocumented immigrants into the United States were dropped, but she still faces state charges of baby buying.
Assistant Webb County District Attorney Roberto Balli said the federal charges were dismissed to allow the state to go ahead with its case.
"The feds have a very strong case. The charges were dismissed without prejudice, meaning they can be reinstated depending on the outcome of (the state's) case," he said.
"If we get a conviction and a stiff sentence in this case, the feds are likely to determine there is no reason for them to go forward."
Balli said numerous women have come forward in the past two weeks with information about Bondoc and AAA-Alamo, as well as other agencies.
"A lot of the women are Mexican, and we know they have legitimate stories because of the detail. They are telling us things that have not been in the media," he said.
The Grays, however, continue to dispute allegations that they targeted pregnant Mexican women, despite running explicit solicitations in Mexican publications for at least five years.
The advertisements, which have run in the newspaper El Norte, published in Monterrey, and in the national magazine Fama, which circulates primarily in Mexico, include long-distance phone numbers that can be dialed ONLY from Mexico.
"Our target audience is someone in a (U.S.) border state wanting to give up a baby for adoption. How they get here, and what their immigration status is, is not our business," Juanita Gray said.
Eleanor Gray said that if a pregnant woman calls from Mexico on the numbers listed in the AAA-Alamo advertisements that run in Mexico, she is told she is out of luck.
"If they tell us they are from Mexico, we tell them we cannot work with them," she said.
However, Consul General Hernandez said the advertisements speak for themselves, as do the stories of the Mexican women.
"The women I spoke to said they responded to the ad in Mexico, and were given instructions by phone on how to get to Nuevo Laredo, and told that all their travel expenses would be paid," he said.
"Once they got to the bus terminal in Nuevo Laredo, they were told to call another number, and someone showed up and took care of them," he said.
jmaccormack@express-news.net
Why does this not suprise me? Anything dealing with Mexico gets swept under the carpet with this administration.
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