Why would you take children out of the country without documentation?

[liberal_at_heart]

The Americans that took children out of Haiti claim they didn't know they were doing anything wrong. But how can anyone possibly think that it would be okay to take a child out of the country for adoption no less without papers? Those Americans obviously didn't get to Haiti without papers and they are just visiting. How could you possibly think this is okay especially if your plan was to adopt them out? Did they really think that just because there had been a natural disaster that they didn't need documentation to have these children adopted? I heard on Good Morning America this morning that they were warned that they would probably get stopped for not having papers and their answer was that they were doing God's work. Who are these people? Do they really think that they have God's authority to take children? Either they knew what they were doing was wrong or they are incredibly stupid. It's possible because they thought they were doing God's work that what they did was right. If that's the case they are dilusional and dangerous. Either way this is not a mistake or crime that can go unpunished as far as I'm concerned.

[no_hypocrisy]

1. One phonecall to the American Embassy would have told them that little.

[John1956PA]

8. They have heard reports that criminals are abducting children and selling them as sex slaves.

I am not taking a side on this, or suggesting that two wrongs make a right. However, last week, a reputable news service (maybe the Associated Press) reported that children in Haiti are being lured by abductors prowling in pickup trucks. The abductors yell out that they are offering food, and the children come running. Supposedly, after being whisked away, the children are sold into a complex international network whereby they are taken to foreign countries and forced into a life of sex slavery, and possibly killed. I do not how how much of that horrid scenario is true.

[woodsprite]

15. My first thought after reading that is that they wanted their share.

I know -- sick mind. But anybody with even half a brain should know that you just can't go someplace and take kids! Those same people would be totally up in arms if someone from Cuba or Mexico came over here during a Katrina-like event and just took the kids. If they were truly and up-and-up religious organization geared toward helping out, they would have provided support and supplies on the ground to the kids. I'm wondering if there one of the churches tied up with a private Christian adoption agency. I know the ones near us have more parents wanting children than they have children to adopt out.

[Oregone]

2. Easier to claim they are orphans and sell em later that way

It was a commercial enterprise setup by some web CEO

[Atman]

3. Did you see the group of men trying to take the children?

Holy shit! How could anyone believe these guys were taking the kids "to a better life?" The story creeped me out when I first heard it -- it FREAKED me out when I saw the pics of the actual people.

.

[njlib]

6. I thought the same thing yesterday

when I saw a picture of them! The first thing that went through my head was "They don't look like a bunch of do-gooding holy rollers. They look like a bunch of child molesters"!

[Uben]

4. Only an idiot would do that...

....and these people must be idiots.........or child traffickers! I can understand wanting to help, many of us have by sending money, but going to Haiti and taking orphans on the "down low" is kidnapping. Anyone with any intelligence at all knows this.
Whatever their motives, they are going to pay for their ignorance.

[beac]

34. And many of them weren't even orphans! Coupled with the fact that many of the kids report they'd

been told they were going on some kind of vacation, and the whole thing stinks to high heaven.

[Arkansas Granny]

5. Maybe we'll find out eventually, but for now it appears that some of the children aren't orphans.

Parents 'reclaim' children in Haiti abduction-adoption row
(AFP) – 2 hours ago

WASHINGTON — The 33 infants and children that an American Christian group tried to smuggle out of quake-hit Haiti are being reunited with their families, the US-based aid group now caring for them said Tuesday.

The children were picked up last week by members of an Idaho-based Baptist group called New Life Children's Refuge who tried to take them across the border to the Dominican Republic where they planned to establish an orphanage.

But some of the children are not orphans at all.

more
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5i4PKyYhpl8n0LsUUtumBTET9UicA

There's something really fishy about this whole story and it can't be explained away by sheer stupidity and lack of information on the part of the church group. Surely someone had to realize that you can't just go in and pick up stray children like you would dogs and cats.

[movonne]

10. Even dogs and cats need papers to go out of a country and enter a

country...

[woodsprite]

16. Sounds like New Life Children's Refuge needs closer investigation

on their home turf.

[NoNothing]

7. Putting aside the people involved

The question in the abstract is not so easy. Is following the law ethical when the law is unethical? Or leads to far worse outcomes?

Would you condemn Oskar Schindler for taking Jewish children out of Nazi Germany without the permission of the German government? I wouldn't. I'm not saying that's what's going on here, but it's not so easy as saying "obviously it was wrong because they didn't have the necessary paperwork!"

[Festivito]

25. I think a lot of these posters don't actually read posts often enough.

Haiti has a destroyed infrastructure such that getting papers could be impossible.

Some of the kids were dehydrated and needed immediate medical care, and got it.

And, the real traffickers are out there, but these guys got these kids before they did.

I'm not saying that these guys are not traffickers disguised as Baptists. But, how about monitoring them rather than detaining them.

The only winners because of all this cynicism are the real traffickers who are drooling their way to their banks as we type.

[suffragette]

36. The article states the children did not receive the care they needed

from the Baptist group.

From the article cited in a post above:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5i4PKyYhpl8n0LsUUtumBTET9UicA
"The parents now are coming to the village to reclaim their children," Heather Paul, the CEO of SOS Children's Villages USA, told NBC's "Today Show". "We already hear that many are saying that we have parents."

Paul said the children had been in poor condition when her group first received them but that they appeared to be on the mend.
"They came quite traumatized, as you can imagine, for a number of reasons. First, the devastation of the earthquake and then the mystery or confusion of their family's disappearance."
"They're getting better," she said. Paul added that while in the care of the US Baptist group, the children, "weren't well dressed, they were dehydrated. They needed medical assistance."
She said the case underscored the need for stricter rules and greater vigilance in dealing with children in Haiti.


I bolded the pertinent section since it could be missed at first glance.

The more that's coming out, the more I question the motives of this group.

[Festivito]

46. Thank you, but this is not enough to conclude ill-will of these takers.

There is nothing, for example, about the condition of the kids when they were taken off the streets be that the case. Was a dehydrated child already dehydrated which requires a certain protocol to alleviate, one should not just give him/her lots of water. Getting the child out of there was more important than leaving one to die. Back to your article: not well dressed, dehydrated, needing medical attention, all make sense in this situation and do not conclude incrimination of the takers.

Do they need stricter rules? Of course! What country doesn't need stricter rules. All countries could use stricter rules pertaining to children.

[suffragette]

48. I responded with that article because you seemed

to imply that the children received needed care from the Baptists and the article proves that was not the case.

I posted lower down about some of the additional info that is making me question their motives.

The issue is that these people were not following rules that were already there and were misleading people about their intent.

[spanone]

37. you are jumping to as many conclusions as those you accuse...

[Festivito]

47. I concluded that we do not have enough information to conclude more.

Does everyone else have but one conclusion? My, what a simple world you live in.

[walldude]

26. Considering that a couple posts up there is a link to an article

that shows some of those kids being reunited with their parents, I'd say there was something bad going down. And your comparison of saving Jews from the gas chamber and stealing children from a country that has just been beset by a natural disaster is way off the mark.

[NoNothing]

30. I'm not saying they are comparable

Just that the OP didn't do the legwork of really making the case it was wrong in this circumstance. Handwringing about paperwork and procedure is not enough.

[phantom power]

9. Because they live in a fucking fantasy world

where only White Christian Americans have real families.

It's like some unholy trifecta of White Exceptionalism, Christian Exceptionalism and American Exceptionalism. Poor brown foreigners don't have legitimate families.

[Dappleganger]

18. +1

[MicaelS]

11. I think this is all about money, period.

They can take these kids to the US and say, "Oh, here is a nice boy or girl who is an orphan, that you can give a good home. The only thing we need is a "donation" of $50,000 to "cover our expenses". :mad:

Reminds me in a perverse way of that John Hershey novel "The Child Buyer".

[Gold Metal Flake]

12. I think the question "who are these people" needs to be asked often.

The superficial does not matter. The cover story does not matter. A full, deep investigation is in order.

[flyarm]

13. More on the Idaho-based baptist baby-snatchers in Haiti

More on the Idaho-based baptist baby-snatchers in Haiti

snip;

Silsby, who is the CEO of a Boise, Idaho-based online shopping Web site, PersonalShopper.com, filed papers last November with the state of Idaho to establish the New Life Children’s Refuge as a nonprofit corporation.

This ambitious project, which secured the backing of a Southern Baptist church in Idaho, called for setting up an orphanage/school in the Dominican Republic beach resort of Playa Magante, which would house up to 200 children and include “seaside villas” to accommodate “adopting parents” from the US during the 60- to 90-day waiting period required under Dominican law...

With the earthquake, the group announced the launching of “Haitian Orphan Rescue Mission,” and their intentions to fly to the Dominican Republic, drive a bus across the border to Port-au-Prince “gather 100 orphans from the streets and collapsed orphanages” and drive them back across the border. Without even having secured a site in the Dominican Republic, much less having built an orphanage, the group claimed it had rented a 45-room hotel, where it could house up to 150 children.

While Silsby claimed that the group understood that all of the children were either orphans or had been abandoned by their parents, CBS News found that the Americans had gone into a Port-au-Prince neighborhood distributing leaflets promising a “better life” for children and a school where they would have a swimming pool and tennis courts. Some Haitian parents said they had given their children because of the desperate conditions they confronted after the earthquake. Some of the children said that they had believed they were being taken on a holiday trip...

The Facebook profiles for Silsby and others in the group are revealing in terms of their political orientation. Silsby’s includes the Facebook page of Alaska’s former right-wing Republican Governor Sarah Palin as one of her favorites, along with that of the Manhattan Initiative, which was established by right-wing evangelicals and Catholics, including convicted Watergate felon Chuck Colson, to oppose the right to abortion and gay marriage...

Back in Idaho, the Rev. Clint Henry of the Central Valley Baptist Church, with which some of the “rescue” group’s members are affiliated, called upon his congregation to pray to God to “help them as they seek to resist the accusations of Satan..."

An estimated one million Haitian children have either been orphaned or lost one of their parents to the January 12 catastrophe. Large numbers have been left in the street, prey not only to Southern Baptists looking to feed the demand for adoptions, but also to professional traffickers, who have abducted children for use as slave labor, in sexual trafficking and, according to Haiti’s prime minister, to be harvested for human organs. Many are believed to have already been smuggled across the border to the Dominican Republic...

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/feb2010/baps-f02.shtm...


These sick MTF'ers are traffickers..and should go to jail from kidnapping and trafficking.

[Dappleganger]

17. These people are incredibly stupid

and belong in jail (where they are currently). IMO they should stay in a Haitien jail in general population, who won't take kindly to sharing a cell with child abductors. This bogus religious jargon "God told us..." is BS and giving every other legit group from US a bad name.

IMO it's not about the money but about CONTROL. The sincerely (though wrongly) believe they were 'called' to save these kids by any means necessary, and since they believe that the children are commodities they could get them by any means necessary. They probably will write a book about this one day to score more cred in their religious community.

[flyarm]

19. they are "NOT STUPID" ..they are traffickers! criminals. eom

[Dappleganger]

20. Anyone who believes that God called them to steal

children is stupid. Did listen to them speak in their interviews? They are seriously deluded and STUPID enough to believe that what they did was to help those children. Other than illegally taking the children out of the country, have they sold them yet? Trafficking involves selling and that had not occurred.

[flyarm]

31. YET!! because they were caught.,,how many haven't been caught?

and how many have already been sold ?

[Arkansas Granny]

23. I found a little more info that states that they already had plans to do this

before the earthquake.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,584423,00.html?test=latestnews

Silsby told the AP that she hadn't been following news reports while in Haiti, and didn't think she needed Haitian permission to take them out of the country. She said they only had the best of intentions and paid no money for the children, who she said were brought to a Haitian pastor by distant relatives.

Silsby, who incorporated the nonprofit New Life Children's Refuge in Idaho on Nov. 25, said she could not provide a contact number for the pastor who put her in touch with the relatives because her papers and cell phone were taken by police.

<snip>

The Idaho churches had elaborate plans before the earthquake to shelter up to 200 Haitian and Dominican boys and girls in the Magante beach resort, complete with a school and chapel as well as villas and a seaside cafe catering to adoptive U.S. parents.

<snip>

Henry, the senior pastor, said the 500-member church wanted to help "because we believe that Christ has asked us to take the gospel of Jesus Christ to the whole world, and that includes children." He said church members had given several thousand dollars to the mission.

When the quake hit, Silsby and her team decided to move faster.

[Romulox]

14. You would if you were a kidnapper or child abducter. nt

[ashling]

21. Two reasons (warning: sarcasm - do not try this at home)

1) To paraphrase Richard Millhousebygod Nixon, Don't you know that if a white Christian American does it it is not illegal; and,

2) extraordinary opportunity to save these children from a pact with the devil

:sarcasm: :puke: :sarcasm: :puke:, etc.

[tuckessee]

22. They don't view them as children - they see them as subhuman.

They see them as cute, poor, wretched, helpless, daring little stray animals who can only be saved by their enlightened and gloriously righteous way.

The end justifies the means to these loons.

[JHB]

24. Remember, these people believe that "Haiti made a deal with the devil" crap...

...that Pat Robertson was spouting, and regard vodoun (and Catholicism, for that matter) as essentially devil worship. Why, it's only christian mercy toe whisk them off thousands of miles from home!

Snatch their bodies to save their souls!

[Arkansas Granny]

27. Check out this little nugget of information. Apparently, they view adoption as

just another way to spread the gospel.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (ABP) -- A Southern Baptist seminary professor says the arrests of a group of Baptists from the United States accused of trying to remove children from earthquake-stricken Haiti without proper documentation could give a black eye to a budding movement of evangelicals who view adoption as a means of spreading the gospel.

http://www.abpnews.com/content/view/4798/53/

The more I read about this, the worse it sounds.

[LibertyLover]

39. Well, I've got one orphan who won't be getting involved with

this vision statement: "The Alliance's vision statement is "every orphan experiencing God's unfailing love and knowing Jesus as Savior." She is growing up a happy little pagan!

[dgibby]

28. If they had the best interests of the children at heart,

it would have been much better to help the parents financially so the children could stay with their parents/relatives.

I think the Haitian government has it right. I think they kidnapped/took those children under false pretenses. Personally, I hope they do hard time in the big house if found guilty. I also hope the US govt checks to see if they can be charged here, as well.

[AngryAmish]

29. THey planned on eating them

That is the only explanation.

[spanone]

32. it's called trafficking.....or stealing....or selling.....call it what you will

[Lydia Leftcoast]

33. Not only that---getting them INTO the States without documentation

would be impossible.

[4_TN_TITANS]

35. Easily brain-washable young converts.

Why else would religious zealots race to remove children from a catastrophe? The benefits of a Mormon sized family without the polygamy.

[CanonRay]

38. Bingo, you hit it on the head

[suffragette]

40. They purposefully misled to get the children, then seemed to have plans

to be the middlemen in adoption. This looks like a money making scheme cloaked in religious zealotry.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/world/americas/03orphans.html


And while the Americans said they did not intend to offer the children for adoption, the Web site for their orphanage makes clear that they intended to do so.
~snip~
Mayor Aniceto Balbuena said that he had been approached by two women about building an orphanage, but that the idea had fallen through because of a legal entanglement.
~snip~
Kisnel and Florence Antoine said they sent two of their children with the Baptist missionaries because they had offered educational opportunities for the children in the Dominican Republic. Ketlaine Valmont said she had sent a son.
~snip~
They also wanted to give opportunities for something better to their children. They said that the missionaries had promised they would be able to visit their children in the Dominican Republic, and that the children would be free to come home for visits.


The article includes a link to a PDF from their website showing the adoption scheme:
http://www.esbctwinfalls.com/clientimages/24453/pdffiles/haiti/nlcrhaitianorphanrescuemission.pdf

New Life Children’s Refuge is a non‐profit Christian ministry dedicated to rescuing, loving and
caring for orphaned, abandoned and impoverished Haitian and Dominican children,
demonstrating God’s love and helping each child find healing, hope, joy and new life in Christ.
We will strive to also equip each child with a solid education and vocational skills as well as
opportunities for adoption into a loving Christian family.
• Villas at Playa Magante*: Villas for adopting parents to stay while fulfilling requirement for
60‐90 day visit as well as Christian volunteers/vacationing families.
• Provide opportunities for adoption through partnership with New Life Adoption Foundation which
works with adoption agencies in the U.S. to help facilitate adoptions and provide grants to subsidize
the cost of adoption for loving Christian parents who would otherwise not be able to afford to
adopt.


So, they lied to the parents that they would be just providing a safe haven away from the devastation for the children to receive an education and still be nearby so the parents could readily visit them when they were really planning for a vacation complex for adoptive parents.

Understandable that a parent faced with the terrible conditions in Haiti and a vouching for these people by a local trusted minister would trust and believe this could be helpful to their children's future.

It's really sickening.

[Bluerthanblue]

41. I read the doctrinal statement on the church website, and it says

they believe :

XVII. Religious Liberty
God alone is Lord of the conscience, and He has left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men which are contrary to His Word or not contained in it. Church and state should be separate. The state owes to every church protection and full freedom in the pursuit of its spiritual ends. In providing for such freedom no ecclesiastical group or denomination should be favored by the state more than others. Civil government being ordained of God, it is the duty of Christians to render loyal obedience thereto in all things not contrary to the revealed will of God. The church should not resort to the civil power to carry on its work. The gospel of Christ contemplates spiritual means alone for the pursuit of its ends. The state has no right to impose penalties for religious opinions of any kind. The state has no right to impose taxes for the support of any form of religion. A free church in a free state is the Christian ideal, and this implies the right of free and unhindered access to God on the part of all men, and the right to form and propagate opinions in the sphere of religion without interference by the civil power.

http://www.centralvalleybaptist.net/cvbc09/faith/

I've been involved with a few evangelical churches in my life, but I've never read a statement like this one- It's pretty troubling in more ways than just the situation they are in right now imo.

[olegramps]

42. These people are zealots.

This makes them above the law and only answerable to a higher power. Bush is of the same mind set and that is why he, along with his neo-con henchmen, justified deceiving the citizens since they were called to a higher mission in life to save the Middle East.

Zealots can not be reformed since they are irrevocably convinced that their mission is ordained by God Himself. God told Bush to invade Iraq. They can justify killing doctors that perform abortions and actually celebrate Shock and Awe invasions of nations that kill thousands of innocent civilians. They are no different than Hitler and his Nazi zealots who justified their blitzkrieg to reign in a thousand years of the glorious Third Reich. These particular zealots are convinced that these children will be far better off being raised by people with a special calling than by what they consider dysfunctional families. They are they Pied Pipers of Hamelin offering desperate children inducements in order to kidnap and indoctrinate them in the name of Christian compassion.

[SoCalDem]

43. My understanding was that they were taking them to an orphanage they run in the Dom. Rep.

There are religious NGOs crawling all over those two countries....supposedly doing the "lord's work", but they get MONEY from their parent organizations for doing that job, and of course, when people plan to adopt, and then spend 6 yrs + "processing" those adoptions (all the while, PAYING money for the upkeep of "their child", is it really a surprise if some of these "charities" might bend some rules to get their hands on a new crop of orphans?

By the time any of those kids would have actually made it OFF the island, they would have had plenty of time to "find" some official paperwork for them..

and many of the kids at orphanages HAVE parents and/or extended families..

It's to the advantage of the charity industry to have a steady supply of "orphans", and the poor people who have a baby every 9-10 months keep them supplied.

The same money paid to "support" those orphans, given to the family..along with a liberal supply of condoms, could lift them out of poverty...

but it's more about the warehousing & hoarding of "sellable" orphans...sellable to people in the US who may have only the best intentions

[hayu_lol]

44. Wonder how many of these wackos speak French?...

lessee, steal the kids. Cross a national border illegally. Maybe set them up 3 to a room in the DR, maybe transport them a few at a time to a privately held island in the area(many exist)and there turn them into money for any one of a number of reasons. These kids would be right at home in Idaho--right?

The Billy Graham group now sees this disaster as an 'opportunity.' Thats what the ads on this site are proclaiming right now. Opportunity. Hmmmm.

Wonder if any of these people had Haitian visas?

[Bluerthanblue]

45. the orphanage they were supposedly taking them to in the DR was

a rented/leased hotel-
They only began their "mission" New Life Children's Relief agency in November.

They might not have had deeply bad intentions for what they planned for the children, but if their behaviour so far is any indication, they shouldn't be allowed custody of ANY children without strict oversight and supervision.

Silsby's claim they were taking the children to an orphanage they had set up in the Dominican Republic makes them sound somewhat legitimate- the fact that they were taking them to a hotel they had leased in Cabarete, while they "built" an Orphanage, shows them to be less so-

:shrug: