Adoptive Couple v Baby Girl Court Transcripts pages 165 to 225 Released

By drip and drabs, we might one day see the full story of the unethical adoption seizure of Veronica Rose Brown.

Just to recap, currently we have the court transcripts from the September 2010 South Carolina Court trial of Adoptive Couple vs Baby Girl:

• The cross examination of Christy Maldonado pages 261 to 312 where she tries not to admit to hiding the Cherokee Nation linage and convince us that she somehow has a right to deny a father knowledge of his child’s pending adoption; pretty much proving that he NEVER intended to be a dead beat dad.
• The FULL testimony of Dusten Brown pages 475 to 541 where he tells a truly heart wrenching story of trying to understand a sudden break up while planning to leave for active military duty in Iraq and fight for his daughter.
• The testimony of Alice Brown, Dusten Brown’s mother aka Veronica Rose Brown’s Paternal grandmother,  pages 557 to 571. This piece speaks to the predisposed bias and gives nod to the corruption in the adoption process.

Today we’ll be adding:

Pages 165 to 225 of Adoptive Couple v Baby Girl Court Transcripts; Melanie Capobianco’s Story

Now of course there are some little tidbits that I do feel the need to point out.

If you happen to take Melanie Capobianco‘s testimony at face value, then this is a clear case of “what not to do in adoption” and perhaps a word to the wise would be: DO NOT TRUST your ADOPTION lawyer!!  Or at least pay attention!

Now granted, at the end, Mr. Ray Godwin seems to come back to clear up his own name and make sure that the transcripts show that he did inform the Capobiancos of some important warnings regarding the status of the adoption, but..

Either the Capobiancos were not bothering to pay much attention to the adoption process and the legal steps necessary to have everything done properly.

Or

 They were too busy only hearing what they wanted to hear and just blindly signed off and paid fees as required.

 Or

Mr. Godwin, who is also involved in a Second Indian Infant Whisked to South Carolina for Quickie Adoption with complete disregard to the ICWA which, after Baby Veronica, Mr. Godwin should be all too familiar with to be able to ignore, did try to pull a fast one on the Capobiancos. Perhaps he told them what they wanted to hear and happily took their money; never imagining that Dusten Brown would have the nerve to fight for the right to parent his own child.

Or, as I would assume,  perhaps, a little bit of all three.

I, again, reading between the lines, do see Mr. Goodwin as trying to cover his own ass. After all, not only is his reputation now severely damaged, but his wife, Laura Godwin, is the director of Nightlight Christian Adoption’s South Carolina offices, which handled the whole baby Veronica Rose Brown mash up.So if they don’t watch it, I would assume the Godwin’s could lose all the means of their income!

However, I also do see Melanie unable to remember a damn thing and I find that very hard to believe. (And this is the point where I will refrain from making and DWI and drunk snarky comments even though I do have to point out that she does admit to those factual truths. I actually do feel that being the DWI and under-aged drinking happened decades ago, as Mealanie Capobianco is obviously MUCH older than her twenties, the fact that she had be expunged for driving drunk does not affect her parenting at this time. We do all make mistakes and that is hardly the worst of them, in my opinion!)

Anyway, I do find it hard to believe that she didn’t literally POUR over every scant bit of information  that they were given about the possibility of Baby Veronica and worry and wring their hands over every tiny movement in the adoption process.  Perhaps, I am stereotyping, but in my experience that is what many perspective adoptive parents do. They also tend to tell everyone and their brother about each little bump or hiccup every step of the way. Damn, I wish they had been blogging.. “Our Journey Home with Veronica Rose”

But really, what I would like to point out here is two main things:

The Cost of this Adoption aka Baby Buying

So in April of 2009, right around the time that Christy was getting all pissy with Dusten, the Capobianco got in touch with Mr. Godwin.

There was a “birth family background report” performed by Nightlight Christian Adoptions where I am assuming they hear about the potential “adoption situation” aka Christy’s pregnancy. That had a fee of only $375.00.

Now Melanie also talks of initially contacting “June Bond”. She is associated with the home study that was preformed around the same time in early April/ May of 2009 and referred the Capobianco’s to a private adoption attorney, namely Mr. Godwin “picked off a list”. Now, June testified that she was paid $1,075.00 for the home study, but Melanie claims that the home study was $1,500.00 for the initial part, then another $500.00 for a post placement and then another $100.00 for a post post visit.

Now there was ANOTHER agency, Adoption Advertising (but Melanie cannot really remember the name of them) that was in contact with Christy and that facilitated the match. They got $8,700.00 though for WHAT I am not exactly sure.  Now, being that Melanie can’t remember who she gave almost 9 grand to, I cannot verify who these folks are.  I did just happen to Google the name and there does happen to be an organization working out of South Carolina under that name! Now, the person who is listed for this organization is Vicki Dalia and she, from a quick Google search, seems to be a big time adoption addict with 8 of her own and an “orphanage in Guatemala, and has quite a bad reputation as a money hungry facilitator.  Now I don’t know for sure if this is who got the money and made the connection with Christy, but I would not say no.

See, for an older couple with a lot of money like Melanie and Matt Capobianco, and an adoption that was seriously fast tracked like Baby Veronica’s, then you DO need to pay up front and pay big time to get your hands on baby that quickly! Or as one post about Ms. Vicki said:

 “If your priority is finding a match at any cost and are willing to get more involved with the adoption I would recommend her. One tip I will give if you do use her as soon as you get matched get the birthmom’s phone number (she will give it to you) and work directly with the birthmom. She prioritizes new situations and once you are matched I found her to be very disinterested.”

I will also add that I found about 56 listings for different websites in about 7 minutes and most of them were now dead ends. She was out of Virginia, reportedly moves moms to Utah, so that says to me that she changes names a lot and stays one step above the law, but is not ethical at all. Somehow, I am not surprised.

Then we have Phyllis Zimmerman who is Christy Maldonado’s attorney, paid for by the Capobiancos. She was paid $2,500.00 in the beginning and forgetful Melanie suspects that the fees are “a lot”  more now since Christy has had more contact with Phyllis Zimmerman that was previously assumed she would when the retainer was paid.

Carol Nichols who also represented Christy during a later part of the trial was alos paid for by the C’s. but they hadn’t had a bill yet. We can assume a typical legal retainer of a few grand. I guess they also had to pay Dr. Saylor for testing about “bonding” and such.

The True Cost of Adoption Baby Veronica Rose

Of course, the initial retainer to Ray Godwin, adoption attorney extraordinaire, was $3,500.00, but Melanie who is wealthy enough not to have to worry about such things, assumes that she must owe or have  paid somewhere around 30 to 40 thousand dollars by the time of the trial in 2010. Need I point out that this was over 3 years ago and I can’t begin to imagine what amount of time must go into the preparation for both South Carolina Supreme Court and then  United States Supreme Court appeal.  But three years ago, by conservative  addition, we are looking at EASILY fifty thousand dollars spent on this unethical  adoption. I am sure that it is easily over a quarter of a million dollars now.

I am not sure WHY, no matter how much they loved little Veronica, the Capobiancos didn’t just stop and try to buy another baby who was less trouble. It’s not like they invested all that time, really. They started adopting in April and they had a baby in their hands by September. That’s less than 6 months.  Just call a do over already. Man, they could have bought out  a dozen kids by now and been happily drowning in sippy cups and diapers.

And then just one more little thing; Can someone please explain to me how this women has a PhD in developmental psychology?

I would assume that she had to at least study a tiny bit about CHILDREN? I guess not!!!

Umm.. lady, It does not take a PhD to KNOW that the emotional cost of the adoption to Veronica is going to be way more than you will ever be able to pay. She is going to hate you FOREVER and you will not be getting the nice sweet little loving child that you think you paid for.

Ok there are other important facts to be pointed out, but go ahead and read it for yourself. I am interested in what you see between the lines.