Word: deboer
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...will start filming its version of the Baby Jessica story this week in cooperation with her custodial parents, Jan and Roberta DeBoer, but without consulting her biological mother and father, Dan and Cara Schmidt. The Schmidts, who won custody, have thus far turned down all offers for their story. They say, however, that they may make a public response to the ABC broadcast...
...Robby DeBoer contracted an infection on her honeymoon, had a hysterectomy and so cannot have children of her own. She heard about Cara through a friend in Iowa and began negotiating to adopt the baby. After Jessica was born on Feb. 8, 1991, Robby and her mother drove from Ann Arbor to Iowa through a fierce snowstorm to see the child and set the proceedings in motion. They got signed parental-rights releases from both Cara and Scott, and the DeBoers' joy was complete. They were now Jessica's legal custodians, and in six more months, the adoption would...
...story that holds so much pain for so many people needs a villain. Each set of parents has found grounds to blame the other, and as the stakes rose and the story went public, the charges got uglier. DeBoer supporters claim it was Cara's lie about the father in the first place that started the trouble. But the Schmidts' advocates retort that at the time she gave up her baby, Cara was in a fragile state, without the help of psychological counseling or legal advice. And the courts could not punish Dan for Cara's deception; he never consented...
Others critical of the DeBoers note that the couple knew early on that the adoption was in jeopardy -- and by continuing to fight while keeping custody of Jessica, says psychotherapist Annette Baran, who specializes in adoption issues, "they've managed to pervert the whole issue of best interests of the child. It's time that people realized that adoption is for children, not infertile adults." Jan DeBoer recoils at such charges. "The Schmidts accuse us of delaying the proceedings to help ourselves," he says. "But I want Jessi to know the truth -- that we only appealed for her own protection...
Suellyn Scarnecchia of the University of Michigan law school took on the DeBoer case through the school's legal clinic, and defends her strategy to fight on. "People don't really understand the psychology of waiting and waiting for a child and bringing one home," she argues. "It is ridiculous to say, 'When you have a problem, give...