Four Employees of Adoption Services Provider
Charged with Conspiracy to Defraud the United States
in Connection with Ethiopia Operations
Four current and former employees of International Adoption Guides Inc. (IAG), an adoption services provider, have been indicted by a grand jury in South Carolina for allegedly conspiring to defraud the United States in connection with IAG’s adoption services in Ethiopia...
Charges include paying orphanages to sign off on contracts of adoption; paying bribes to Ethiopian government officials; creating counterfeit U.S. Customs and Immigration Service forms.
Read the rest here.
When we were first starting out and researching agencies, I contacted IAG. They had an office near us in North Carolina. In reply to my inquiry email, they sent me photos of and information about every child on their waiting child list. I thought this was very weird. I had no homestudy; they didn't know the first thing about me. That alone made me cross them off our list. Later I heard many horror stories about them.
I don't think this is the end of IAG. Indictments do not equal convictions. But at least in the future, when prospective adoptive parents inquire on a message board about IAG, there will be something official and legal to point them to, something that can't so easily be dismissed as rumor, as "if it didn't happen to you personally, you shouldn't talk about it."
I was glad to see that this step has been taken. We'll see what comes of it, but I hope it has every adoption agency reviewing its activities and making changes for the better.
ReplyDelete