Baby Gabriel Aftermath: News that Another Child Placed with Family in Mexico Murdered in 2005. State Conducted No Criminal Background Checks.*

December 17, 2007

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Oregon’s Department of Human Services says 96% of the kids they place are in better situations (no more abuse etc). But with DHS having been ready to ship out Gabriel Allred to Mexico with a Grandmother he’d never known, speaking a language he’d never spoken, in a country he’d never been, the state agency is naturally being second guessed about the wisdom of doing this. It’s no small thing to take a US citizen and exile him to another country, essentially forsaking the rights to which he’s entitled here. In addition, oversight of the placement is nonexistent by US authorities. In its hackneyed rationale, the agency believes strangers that are blood who live in a third world country are better than the foster parents he knows as his parents who live in the US, a first world country. Some folks believe it’s racist to say that, but those are just the facts.

But now it is disclosed by DHS spokesman Greg Parker that one of those previous 11 children placed in other countries was murdered. The June 2005 case concerned a four year old child whose paternal aunt and uncle were charged with the murder. Read here and here.

DHS tells me that this placement occured before they checked the criminal records of people with whom they placed children. They now check LEDS and NCIC and do fingerprinting to do a criminal background check. No criminal background checks?

The court authorized the placement in December 2003 and Adrianna was placed in Mexico on 7-18-04. There is no case documentation as to how the relatives were selected or whether any committee process took place in determining the suitability of the family. DHS received an adoption home study on 4-5- 05 that was completed by DIF. The home study cited no difficulty with the placement. There is no case documentation outlining the responsibility of DIF to supervise the placement of the child.

Greg Parker tells me this in response:

Yes we have always done background checks. They have become more vigorous.
For current international placements that is also true. For example, in the Allred case verification from the Attorney General’s Office for the State of Puebla that informs that: ….”Ms. Cecilia Rosalia Martinez Garcia has been identified and it is noted that there are NO registered criminal records in the archives of this Institution, nor in the National Registry of Identification, according to the data verified by Ms. Rosaria Oropeza Olivares, operator of the AFIS system and an employee of this office.”
Tell ’em where you saw it. Http://www.victoriataft.com