Fifteen years ago, my wife and I flew to Moscow to adopt our son. It was the best thing we ever have or ever will do, but it was harrowing: we were rushed through the process along with four other couples at fugitive speed, because Boris Yeltsin’s government was about to shut down foreign adoptions any day. The whole experience felt like a spy movie, being pushed into black cars driven by strangers, watching bribes take place, and racing from building to building, from doctors to mysteriously grim bureaucrats. We got our son his passport at the American Embassy just as word arrived that foreign adoptions in Russia would be suspended for months.
Now adoptions by Americans in Russia have been suspended again, not just because, as was the case in 1995, Russia’s inability to find native parents for its own children is a national embarrassment, but because of a horrific act of betrayal by an American family. Justin Hansen, 7-years-old, arrived in Moscow alone, carrying a note from the woman who had adopted him to Russian authorities, reading,
“After giving my best to this child, I am sorry to say that for the safety of my family, friends and myself, I no longer wish to parent this child.”
That was enough for the Russians, and I don’t blame them.
The mother, Torry Ann Hansen, also listed her reasons in the note to the Russian authorities. The boy was violent, she said, and severely disturbed. She was lied to, she protested, by the orphanage workers.
These things may all be true; probably they are. Many Russian orphans have increasingly serious emotional and psychological problems the longer they stay in the institutions. Russian orphanages are sad, heart-breaking places, overcrowded with beautiful children who desperately want to go home with every visitor. The people who run them are heroes, every one: they treat the children lovingly, and will do and say anything—anything—to place as many children as possible in loving homes across the ocean. If you have come for one child, they will produce his brother, or three, and ask if you really, really want to break up a family. Sometimes, it may not even really be a brother, but the kids know how to play along, because they want out. My wife and I were giving a tour of the orphanage, and I had to break it off. “Let’s get our baby out of here now, or I’m going to crack and adopt ten kids,” I said. I was in tears. I still have nightmares about that tour, and guilt that I couldn’t (wouldn’t?) save more children from the miserable existence facing them.
It doesn’t matter if Torry Hanson was lied to, or how difficult her son was. Adoption is a one-way transaction, as much as birth. You can’t ship your child back via stork because she isn’t perfect, and you can’t ship your adopted child back to Russia because he is making your life a living hell. This is your child, completely, and there is no receipt. You have assumed the greatest, most challenging relationship of trust there is, and you are in for the ride of your life. There is no getting off, because your child trusts you absolutely.
Sending an innocent child back to the orphanage, like he was a defective toaster returned to Walmart, is the ultimate betrayal, as unforgivable as treason, and far, far worse than adultery. A child who, in Justin’s case (his Russian name had been Artyom), was neglected by his alcoholic mother and taken by the state, sent to an orphanage and given to an American mother, has been rejected again and abandoned. I cannot imagine what this would do to a child. I cannot imagine allowing anyone’s child to endure this, least of all my own.
Her son was making her life impossible. She couldn’t handle the stress; she looked into the future and saw only problems. Check: I understand. I empathize with Mrs. Hanson completely, for we knew when we adopted our son that this was a possible scenario. Again, it doesn’t matter. Sending an adopted child back to Russia is not an option, because it is absolutely wrong, like murder, like torture, like sacrificing one human being to save another. Never. Absolutely never. Nothing can ever justify treating a child—your own child— like that.
There may be other villains in this story, notably Hanson’s adoption agency, which seemingly did not do a very good job vetting Hanson’s adoption application. Russian authorities also have long-standing problems in their system. When we were in Moscow, the policy was that only “damaged” children could be adopted by foreigners, so the Russian doctors falsely certified that healthy babies had terrible deformities and maladies to get them out of the orphanage. When the policy was changed, healthy children could be adopted (meaning that few parents will accept unhealthy ones), so orphanage staff sometimes try to send the “unadoptable,” unhealthy children to American homes by getting false certifications.
Nevertheless, it should not matter how one’s child arrives, whether from a wild moment in the back of a ’98 Chevy van, a sperm bank donor, or an adoption. Your child, always, no turning back.
The rejection of her son by Hanson and the shockingly cold manner in which she did it, putting a seven-year-old on an international flight alone, also has had predictable consequences that will harm countless others. The New York Times interviewed one devastated couple whose adoption efforts were cut short just as they were on the verge of adopting a Russian child. Hanson’s mistreatment of her son may doom hundreds or even thousands of Russian children to years in orphanages, and block many Americans who could give them love, good homes and a bright future from doing so. More than 50,000 Russian orphans have become American citizens since 1991.
The ethical, moral and primal conclusion here should not be in question. Your child is your child, for good or ill, forever. Those who cannot make that commitment should not reproduce or adopt.
It really is that simple.
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Note: The wonderfully named website O Solo Mama currently is featuring a discussion of the many facets of this case, as well as links to useful articles and scholarly works on the problems of international adoption.
Ethics Alarms 
With all the abuse and mistreatment of children, especially those not psychically-related to the actual mother and father, I personally believe that they should receive an award for sending back that troubled child back to Russia. I see that Dr. Phil may disagree, but that was a legitimate solution to address the needs of that troubled child before that child injured or killed someone by setting the house on fire like he had threatened and demonstrated he was capable of doing.
This is one of the most tragic things I have ever heard of. I have no words.
Sometimes, people do stupid things that reverberate through society for a long time, but this just might take the all-time cake.
I literally wrote that post with tears in my eyes. Of course, I couldn’t write that because one of the 8.4 trolls would find some way to show that I was using onion juice…
Wow, Michelle, I find that point of view mind-blowing. Would you advocate sending a “natural” child to Russia? If so, I will grant you consistency. Because to me, there is no difference.
None.
No, I would not send a “natural” child back to Russia. In that case, the parents made a choose to conceive. Basically for the adopted child, they “purchased” him and it was more defective than they were told.
Michelle, I just think that’s offensive. A foreign adoption is no more a purchase than any other adoption. It is not like buying a puppy. Parents make a choice to accept responsibility for a child, and the manner makes no difference at all, especially to the child. Every adoptive parent regards their child as being as much their’s as if he or she came out the mother’s womb. If they don’t, something is seriously wrong with THEM. Your attitude, that adopted children are something less, is why there are so many parentless kids while couples spend thousands on fertility techniques.
You really need to re-think this.
I can understand trying to give away a child if you really feel he or she would be better off with someone else (that’s part of the reason why adoption exists, anyways), but in this case, she just tossed him away, without trying to find someone else to take care of him or even just making the trip back with him. True, the child seems to be incredibly disturbed, but they don’t deserve parental care any less then more adjusted children.
A foreign adoption is like a purchase of buying a puppy (good analogy) because the prospective parents put out a lot of money anticipating a certain parameter-of-results, unlike a natural situation. When you look at adoptive parents as a group of parents that likely have little or no experience, that child is lucky things went as well as it did for that child.
No, Julian, I don’t think the adoptive person just tossed anyone away as you claim. I thought the child was put on a plane and returned back to Russia due to the risk of danger was greater than what that person was told. If it was a puppy, it likely would have been put down here in the states.
That’s bloody obvious. Of course, Russian organizations tend not to be the most ethical in the world, to say the least, and I’m not saying the agency didn’t screw up incredibly, but I was always under the impression that adoption meant that you took on the same responsibility for the child as if he or she was born to you. And while I know little about child-raising (at 19, I’d hope so), I’m not sure a year is necessarily enough to have a disturbed 7 year old fully adjust to a new situation. Networks and organizations for adoptive support or matching children to new prospective parents do exist, even if it means the process will still be much longer and more arduous then just sending them back to the foster home.
On the bright side, I’d agree that the mom wasn’t ready for kids anyways, and I hope if there is a next time, it turns out much better.
It sounds more to me these parents were ill prepared for adoption from the first place and if they should ever try to adopt in the future it should be denied.
No mater what documents these parents signed. No matter information they were given. They entered in to a contract of the heart with this child when they chose to adopt him. To turn their backs on him and to toss him aside as if he was a stray dog that pissed on their carpet is indefensible.
Oh, so absolutely right, Bill, in every way. But you have, I observe, an innately true compass, either from the Marines, or from birth. It’s a gift.
Are you people for real….seriously…they adopted a child who turns out to be very disturbed and you all think they should have kept him? Here in america if faced with a biological child who has serious mental illness and is a threat to himself and others then the child is institutionalized. Do you really think they should have kept him and waited for him to harm himself or other family members? We are not talking about a child who just misbehaves occasionally or is just stubborn or unruly…these children grow up to murder their parents. Of course we should not give back our children …biological or adopted..thats not what this article is about….it is about serious mental illness not told to the adoptees who are not phsycologists or institutions equipped to deal with this sort of thing. These are your average families and I don’t know of any family that could handle a truly emotionally and physically disturbed child! So give this family a break…you have no clue what there situation was ….. I doubt any of you could take this child home and make him all better!!
The child is 7. I think concluding that a 7 year old is a murderous sociopath is a bit premature. Many children with attachment disorder can be successfully treated. An ill adopted child should be treated exactly as one would treat a so-called birth child. Would you send a child with cancer back to Russia?
Well, I expected you never lived with a murderous seven year old either, just a hunch. Not sure where you came up with a diagnosis of a psychopath, I haven’t seen any mental health records on that child, but it appears you have Jack. Got a link for those records or maybe an address of the agency holding those records that I can go to get a peek at that diagnosis you claim?
Oh, a sociopath, not a psychopath as I stated. My bad. Sorry. 😦
That’s OK–it could be either. A seven year old that was already ” a murderer” would, I believe, either have to be a psychopath or a sociopath, though there may be a third alternative. Outside of “Halloween,” I really doubt that a “murderous 7 year-old” is very plausible. That is a side issue, anyway. I don’t care if the kid is Damien, Son of Satan. It is absolutely wrong to abandon him.
He wasn’t abandoned, he was returned. Big difference.
Ditto Cindy. 🙂
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The person that returned the child to Russia should receive an award, like an honorary doctorate degree in Psychology and should be paid handsomely to tour the prisons and give speeches to convicts who have mistreated or otherwise harmed children, and emphasize that there are always alternative options to take. 🙂
“Would you send a child with cancer back to Russia?” Yes, if it was not stated that the child had cancer when I made the adoption; absolutely and positively I would return the child under those circumstances.
Wow. Just…wow. I’m in awe.
And most right-minded orphanages would tell you where you could put that return request…
It isn’t a return request, it’s simply a return.
Uh huh. I am humming the Twilight Zone theme now…
My husband and I don’t have kids yet. We have rescue dogs. After 7 months of trying to make our 3rd dog happy, we finally surrendered him to a no kill shelter. I’m well aware of the difference between humans and dogs…but just to give an example: We rescued him 4 days before euthanization from a shelter. We spent $2K on him…numerous vet visits, behavioral training, pet psychics, organic diets, aromatherapy…you name it, we tried it. The final straw was not just that he seemed unhappy and made the other two dogs miserable, but that we were unable to get a night of sleep for several nights in a row. But we literally tried everything. It broke our hearts to surrender him, but at that point, there wasn’t another choice for us. When we gave him up, it was in person, with many tears. But we made a mega effort to make it work-and this was a DOG. This woman didn’t even make that much effort for a human being…just put him on a plane like a piece of clothing that didn’t fit. All living things deserve an effort. She should have exhausted every venue of therapy and medication if things were that bad. Final straw should have been putting him in an institution, not back on a plane to a country where they are ill equipped to handle a healthy child, much less one with severe problems. That is what’s wrong with our country today-no one wants to take personal responsibility. Everything is someone else’s fault, and no one accepts their own lot in life. We go through spouses and jobs and kids like Kleenex. Things are too easy, and it’s leading to a downfall of quality of life. It’s true-there are so many unwanted kids out there, but if she wasn’t going to keep him as promised, she should have gone the distance to get him help and ready for parents who would love him. Shame on her.
That’s right. We adopted a lovely Basset Hound from a family; he was a wonderful dog in many ways, but he would suddenly lose it and bite anyone near him. He bit me, my wife twice, and when he bit my son, who trusted the dog completely, we knew we had to do something. We tried everything….but we did not bring him back to the family who gave him to us, though I have always believed he was abused and they had to know he was not right. He was our dog, and we loved him. Our problem. The story did not have a happy ending. Still, once h was our responsibility, we lived up to it.
To frame my comment: I’m an adoptive parent fo two children, both young adults and both born in Korea. My children did not experience the kind of emotional trauma that Artyom Savelyev demonstrated; we never lived in fear that our children might take violent actions against us or our home.
However, the timeframe for this adoption doesn’t match the level of violence the adoptive mother and grandmother stated the child demonstrated. He was adopted in September 2009, seen by social workers in a post-adoption visit in January 2010 (they found no issues). His grandmother said his violent behavior escalated after that visit.
Eight months is hardly sufficient time to diagnose and provide therapy to a child with an emotional illness. Whether this adoptive parent was unsuccessful in finding support or simply chose not to do so makes no difference – nothing condones the action she took. There are legal steps that can be taken to terminate an adoption, which she should have followed.
I agree on the time line…the kid had a couple bad months, and back he goes? This is either not true, or a terrible over-reaction.
I object to undoing an adoption for any reason, including fraud. Once the adoption is complete, it is all about the child.
Eight days is long enough to determine if you got what you purchased. The kid had to go; defective but no stretch of the imagination with no prior acknowledgment by the Russian adoption agency. Send him back A.S.A.P.!
It is not a purchase—it is an adoption. When I adopted my son, I did not pay a price for him. Child selling is illegal. It is an administrative act. There are no guarantees with any children, no warranties of perfection. What if he “broke” and died? With your logic, you’d ship his body back for a refund.
An adoption actually is a purchase. Did the potential-adoptive person spend even a penny on the effort to get a child? If the answer is a yes, it’s a purchase, at least according to the facts of this case. 🙂
If eight days is long enough to observe whether or not something (or in your opinion someone, which is just pathetic) is “defective”, then it would stand to reason that this woman had more than enough chance to make said observation. Russia requires a ten day waiting period (spent in-country) before they allow the parents to leave with the child. So, by your own definition, she had the chance to refuse and did not do so, thereby strengthening the case that she was negligent. She had a choice (more so than a biological parent, actually) and didn’t like how it turned out. Tough. You should really do some research before you try to sound as if you know what you are talking about.
I’m making this comment separate from the one regarding this post, as it’s more of a message to you then a comment to the post.
As this is an ethics blog and you are an adoptive parent, I’m curious why there is nothing on your blog regarding the injustice of closed adoption records. I’d be interested in your take on this issue.
We’ll get there—this blog is less than six months old. E-mail me and tell me what your thoughts are.
Thanks, I’ll do that.
Michelle, there just is no difference in this scenario between “returned” and abandoned, except that abandoned would probably have been better for both the boy and international relations. He’d be a lot better off in a US foster home than in a Russian orphanage. Sometimes your arguments make me feel like I have gone through the looking glass…
There is a huge issue between abandoned and returned. This child was never abandoned, not in any way, shape, or form, at least according to what I have seen of this case thus far. Confirmation of abandonment might be verified, potentially, if charges come down and a conviction for abandonment is correctly obtained. But, until a conviction by a court of Law, it appears legally to be a case or a return.
Arrrghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! What are you TALKING about? A mother sent her child to a foreign country! That is as illegal as sending him out in a rowboat. She has legal responsibility: this is just like leaving him on a doorstep, except its an airport. There is no legal entity called “a return.” A child isn’t a piece of property! Why are you taking such bizarre position?
I don’t think we have heard the whole story from both sides of the ocean. And, sorry, it was a good idea to close the adoptions from Russia, at least until issues are better worked out for both parties, the adopters and the adoptees. I read where 13 Russian adopted children in the last 10 years or so have met their deaths in American homes where they had been adopted and these deaths were not accidents. Something is terribly wrong here. Either the parents were not properly screened or the parents were not prepared for the children that were adopted. Clearly there were parent-child bonding issues they have lead to these tragedies. It is too simplistic to say “the child is your kid, deal with it”. This clearly is not the answer to the problem.
I have a measure of sympathy for the woman who put the child on the plane back to Russia. Why? Perhaps the mother just simply did not know what else to do and thought this was the best decision. At least the child is safe…
I would close Russian adoptions too. Saying the parents were not properly screened is stating the obvious, but that doesn’t change the culpability of the parents or the revolting nature of the conduct. The Secret Service did a lousy job protecting JFK—that didn’t mean that Oswald had to kill him. The child is “safe” in the sense that he hasn’t been murdered; that’s not much to cheer. Orphans in Russia stay in their prisons until they are 18, and then they are let out on the street, where they become prostitutes, drugs or criminals, often ending up dead or in jail. That’s not safe enough. I repeat: she should have given her child up to US child services, where he would have had a fighting chance. The mindset that a child can be “returned” like a commodity is one reason why these kids get killed. Let’s settle one wrong at a time.
People in-process might disagree with you totally, since there is no known crime that has even occurred in this case. Until a conviction occurs, if ever, Russian adoptions should continue if you have the best interests of the children involved. Otherwise, it could be interpreted as being hypocritical.
1. What is “people in process”?
2. “No known crime”? Sending your child away with a note to a stranger IS a crime…it is called child abandonment. Once he is adopted, he belongs in Russia as much as he belongs in Thailand. He’s a US citizen.
3. I have no idea–none—what those last two sentences are supposed to mean.
You are not really asking to be spoon-fed the facts, are u? Anyways, give that person a medal for returning that defective violent child, and make that person oversee all international adoptions from here on out. 🙂
No, I’m just asking for English.
I guess you can re-read it then, and let me know what I can better clarify. Have a great day too Jack. 🙂
Jack, thanks for the shout-out. Great blog you have going here. I will definitely return.
Thank -you. Yours is truly remarkable. Brava!
You state: “Russia’s inability to find native parents for its own children is a national embarrassment.”
And what of America’s inability to care for our own? What of the half a million children in foster care – 129,000 of whom could be adopted as those eager to parent spend tens of thousands and travel thousands of miles to strip children of their culture and heritage?
Some say it is in the quest of younger and less “damaged” children. Well, clearly a seven-year-old who has been institutionalized does not fall under with of those categories.
Why/How does an adoption agency – in this case WACAP – allow a single parent to take on such an obviously difficult challenge? What kind of preparation and expectations did she have?
Why do tragedies like this occur? Because adoption has become a BUSINESS and even “non profit” agencies need to pay salaries, rent and expenses to stay in business and the only way they do that is by closing the deal. And so they become used car (insert child) salespeople and skimp on revealing all the problems with the product (insert child) to complete the transaction and get paid their fee. They care as much as the best interest of the children they are redistributing as the car salesman cares about how the car is taken car of once the check clears and it is driven off his lot.
It’s a despicable disgrace. And we support these transactions with tax benefits – using special needs kids in foster care as pawns to get congress to increase these benefits year after year when precious little of those tax credits go to the adoption of such children, as there are virtually no fees involved. Instead we subsidize cultural genocide to meet a demand while ignoring our own children in need and because when not happy with our “purchase” we return the damaged goods. Some even go further and sue the adoption agencies for wrongful adoption – which very likely may have been next on Hansen’s to-do list: Seeking a refund of her expenses for the imperfect merchandise she paid for.
Mirah Riben, “The Stork Market: America’s Multi-Billion Dollar Uregulated Adoption Industry”
http://AdvocatePublications.com
Excellent synopsis Mirah, excellent job. And, ditto. 🙂
1) I could call this spam, but chose not to. I think it adds to the discussion, though it is really an univited way to use my site to promote your book.
2) I wasn’t writing a book, I was writing about one specific aspect of this matter. When someone says, “What about…?”, my answer almost always is “i write about what I want to write about when I want to write about it.” What you reference is a different, though related, topic, and some day I will get around to it.
3) As long as America allowed birth parents to show up and try to undo adoptions, my wife and I were going to look abroad. Our agency was superb, and our son is the light of our life. We were, indeed, lucky.
AP here- adopted 2 girls from China (ages 6 & 11) one of which was a very challenging older child adoption.
Michellefrommadison wrote-
“…but that was a legitimate solution to address the needs of that troubled child before that child injured or killed someone by setting the house on fire like he had threatened and demonstrated he was capable of doing.”
I have seen this argument play out elsewhere across the net and find it quite appalling. If you agree that this child is a potential murderer, which you obviously do, then how do you justify sending him back to an orphanage? What help do you think he will receive there because he obviously wasn’t receiving that help before the adoption?
Thank God he didn’t kill a little American family and so what if he burns down an orphanage filled with children? I guess that makes sense to you since “they purchased him and it was more defective than they were told”. No worries if ‘it’ burns down what must be a bunch of defective Russian orphans.
Diane, We need to cut Michelle some slack—I am convinced that he comments make up some very sophisticated variety of satirical performance art, and shouldn’t be taken literally. How they should be taken, I haven’t the slightest clue.
Ok Jack. Will do. Although the performance is a bit nausea inducing and I must not be sophisticated enough to get it. I’ll go pop an antacid. On with the show 😉
It must be. At this point, seeing it as an act is the only way to keep faith- no, nevermind. There it went.
We must abstain from feeding trolls.