Vi🎀ckie and Richard Allen paid $6,000 to an adoptio⭕n facilitator for the twins they called Kiara and Keyara.
But just as the plump-cheeked little girls were settling in to the nursery in the couple’s San Bernardino home, they were lost to a British family who paid the same Internet broker $12,000 for the babies.
Now two couples on two continents are battling each other and the children’s birth mother for custody of the tiny twins, whose future is as unsure as their names.
The case has caused a⛄ flurry of controversy in Britain, where their new adoptive parents have renamed the twins Kimberley and Belindaꩵ, since The Sun broke the story last week.
British authorities now have custody൲ of the infants, whose tragic journey has taken them from St. Louis to California to Arkansas and now North Wales.
The saga began when Tranda Wecker, 28, a St. Louis hotel worker and mother of three, realized she couldn’t care for the twins she was carrying.
She found a number for A Caring Heart, a s🌜ervice specializing in mixed-race adoptions headquartered in the San Diego home of Tina Johnson.
Johnson, who uses the Internet to make adoptive matches, connected Wecker with th🗹e Allens, and the young woman flew to California to visit the couple, said John Giffen, a lawyer for the Allens.
“She spent 10 days with them and felt like she was doing the right thing,” Giffen said. “My clients were going to give these babies a really nice home.”
Apparently satisfied with her choic꧟e, Wecke♕r returned to St. Louis.
After paying Johns♒on $6,000, the Allens began the pr♔ocess of adopting the twins.
“They were just tickled pink to have these two girls,” Giffen said.
The Allens remained in contact with Wecker, so they weren’t surprised when the twins’ birth mother asked to spend a few days with the tots to finish saying goodbye. They brought the babies to Wecker at a San Diego hotel for a 48-hour visit.
Wecker delivered her babies into the hands of Judith and Alan Kilshaw, a Welsh couple who had paid Johnson $12,000 for the infants on the Internet, and had traveled to San Diego to pick t🐻hem up.
The Allens immediately vowed to fight for the twins and accused the baby broker of manipulating the mother ♑into taking the children away from them.
By California law, the birth mother had the right to remove her children from the Allens’ home because the adoption was not yet finalized.
Wecker traveled with the Kilshaws and Johnson to Arkansas, where state laws allow adoptions to go through in just 10 days. Papers in han🍃d, the Kilshaws whisked the babies away to Br🌌itain.
The case turned into a controversy in Britain, where private adoptions are illegal, and the press dubbed the Kilshaws the “Baby Trade Couple.”
Soon after, the Allens, the Kilshaws and෴ the birth mother began arguing their cases on major TV networks.
Prime Minister Tony Blair called Internet baby trading “deplorable,” and said, “Adoption should always be about the child first.”
British soc𝐆ial-service agencies removed the twins from the Kilshaws on Friday, and the High Court is set to hear their case next week.
“I am fighting the whole of the British public and the whole of the British government,” Kilshaw told Sky TV News Friday.
In the United States, the twins’ case has drummed up debate about disparities in adoption laws across state lines.
A Little Rock judge has cast doubt on the legality of the Kilshaws’ adoption, telling the BBC that the birth mother possibly perjured herself when she told the court she had lived in Arkansas for 30 days.
“It would appear in this case that there are a number of villains and thus far no heroes,” Judge Ellen Brantley told the BBC.
The FBI has confirmed it is investigating the ad🔥options. And Wecker, who claims she made no money from her babies, told CBS News that she regretted giving the girls up.
“I really want my girls back. I really do,” said Wecker.
The Allens blame the mess on the baby broker, who they say sold their twins to the highest bidder. But Tina Johnson has insisted, through a spokeswoman, that her business does not “sell, trade or engage in the trafficking of babies.”
Johnson claims that she gave the babies to the Kilshaws because she feared the Allens would not pay her the $2,500 they owed her.With Post Wire Services