Colombia Adoptions-8 or 9 “problem cases” or something else? UPDATED
Colombia has made some waves over the past few days and months.
Back in February 2012, there was a reversal of an adoption.
Adopción: Corte acoge tesis de la Procuraduría [El Nuevo Siglo 2/19/12], Google translation pasted below:
“It is the first time the Constitutional Court reverses a judgment of adoption that had been upheld by the Supreme Court on appeal for review.
The requirements and points raised by the Prosecutor for the Defense of the Rights of the Child, Youth and Family before the Constitutional Court, to which shall protect the fundamental rights of a teenager to have a family, unless separated from it, dignity, care, health, emotional and mental, were welcomed at the Judgment T-844 of 2011, which ordered, inter alia, revoke an adoption judgment rendered by a family court judge.
The prosecution presented the September 16, 2010 a concept before the Board of Review Seventh Wards of the Constitutional Court, which requested the revocation of the adoption decree, arguing that irregularities were committed by the Institute attributable Colombian Family Welfare (ICBF) in the administrative process (in place of the Juvenile Code for the material time), when it was decided that a 9 year old girl have been abandoned and as a protective measure ordering the initiation of procedures adoption.
The Delegate, based on the principle of best interests of the child, based his request on the care provided by extended family members during their first years of age, who assured him their general welfare. In this concept of Control Agency, the ICBF not carefully analyzed the family environment so the child should never be separated from it or find another family to the emotional ties that always remained with whom she was raised. The Attorney General considered that this situation contributed to the present strained relations between the adopter and adopted and the subsequent reinstatement of the child to ICBF within months of adoption.
These theses were accepted by the Attorney Constitutional Court in its judgment stated that “the finality of adoption does not mean that in cases where they have ignored the fundamental rights of children and adolescents and their family , it is not appropriate as something exceptionalism “. The High Court made no effect ICBF resolution by which the girl declared abandoned, overturned the judge’s ruling family which was decreed by the adoption and had been reviewed by the Board of Civil Appeals the Supreme Court to decide the appeal for review and reversed the judgments handed down in home care by the same corporation.
With its decision, the Constitutional Court granted the protection of fundamental rights of the minor to have a family, not to be separated from her and the due process allowed her (now 17-year old single mother) continue living together with his sister on his mother and grandparents, without simultaneously to return to her biological mother or his extended family. The judgment also ordered the inclusion of mother and child in the programs that currently exist or those that come to create to meet their emotional, psychological and economic.
One of the approaches to the Attorney to the Constitutional Court was to ask the ICBF to design a protocol manual which defines the guidelines to be followed by officials of that institution as to the procedure in adoption issues. The Constitutional Court fully accepted this thesis prosecutors and ICBF urged to adopt this protocol to not make the mistakes that were evident in the case demanded.
Constitutional Court stressed the importance of listening to the minor in evidence during the administrative process in order to obtain greater certainty about the extent that it was more advisable for their protection, a procedure that failed at the time the family advocate have disclosed that the perception of the child on the family with whom he lived. The prosecutor delegated Ilva Hoyos Myriam Castaneda moved on July 9, 2010 to the city that was the teenager and attended his statement (in the process of reviewing guardianship), which corroborated with the application of the revocation of the adoption decree law was what belonged to whom wrongly separated from their family environment.
The Prosecutor for the Defense of the Rights of the Child, Youth and Families held a permanent monitoring of ICBF management against the guarantee of the rights of the child during the years 2010 and 2011, even told the Court Constitutional about her pregnancy and later on the birth of their son in August 2011 and also asked the High Court promptly uttering the sentence of supervision.
The Office will continue to monitor the security and effectiveness of the rights of the adolescent mother and her son and will be monitored by the Constitutional Court ordered in the sentence.”
ICBF Review
“Colombia‘s Family Welfare Institute “kidnaps” Colombian children by giving them up for adoption to foreign families against the will of their biological parents, several reports said.
In a program aired Sunday, television station Caracol told the story of a young boy named Steven who was born in Colombia but adopted by a Dutch family.
Steven’s biological parents said he was taken from them against their will by the ICBF. The agency said Steven’s original parents were unfit to care for him and that the state put the child up for adoption for his own safety. Colombia is one of the few countries where children can be placed with foreign families without the consent of their biological parents.
This is not the first time the ICBF has been accused of unjustifiably taking children from parents and sending them abroad. Colombian channel RCN TV and Colombian newspaper El Tiempo have run similar stories in the past.
Responding to the accusations ICBF Director Diego Molano told the El Colombiano newspaper the claims were based on errors made in old cases and the ICBF is changing its policies to correct them.
“It’s eight or nine problem cases and we’re looking into them now,” said Molano.
In cases of children being forcibly taken from parents Molano said, “There are reasons the [ICBF] has taken these decisions,” citing children in at-risk situations.
According to the U.S. State Department Colombia allowed the adoption of 216 children by U.S. families last year. In comparison, Colombia’s neighbor Ecuador allowed six children to be sent to the US in 2011.”
Colombian state ‘kidnaps’ children for overseas adoption: Reports
[Colombia Reports 4/16/12 by Arron Daugherty]
Vigilarán programas de adopción del ICBF [El Neuvo Siglo 4/16/12], Google translation pasted below:
“On the instructions of Attorney General AlejandroOrdonez, the Delegate for the Defense of the Rights of the Child, Youth and Families introduced a monitoring process today than Colombian Family Welfare Institute (ICBF), in orderto verify compliance of the constitutional and legal obligations in relation to the organization of the Adoption Program nationally and internationally as the authority in central Colombia.
This monitoring provided for in the Annual Operating Planof the Special Prosecutor, is extended to five institutions authorizedin Bogota to developadoption programs (IAPAS), in order to verify compliance with the legal andtechnical guidelines byinstitutions and the CareServices Program SpecializedProtection (supply contracts), pursuant to the provisions of the Code for Children and Adolescents.
28 public servants of the Control Agency form the committee to check whether the Adoption Program is aimed at guaranteeing the rights ofchildren and adolescents and determine whetherthe development of the Adoption Program has been implemented protection doctrineintegral. Of thevisits will risethe respective acts andsubmit a report to ICBF.
This preventive action the Attorney General’s Office complies with the abovemonitoring role for preventive and management controlto public entities and individuals who perform public functions in defense and guarantee of the rights of children and adolescents and their family context.”
REFORM Puzzle Piece
Update/June 27, 2012: Multiple, public personal blogs and at least one adoptive parent forum are reporting that ICBF is reviewing all 1,300 case files of children in their database due to a court order. Agencies are telling clients that this is causing delays in referrals.
Additionally, there are reports that some nonUS families are “stranded” in country for three months during a judicial review. The purpose of the review is to ensure that everything was done to reunify the children with the original family before finalizing the adoption.
The city of Bucaramanga is mentioned as one of the areas in which reviews are being done.
At this time we could find no media articles or adoption agencies sharing this information.
Update 2/October 23, 2012: Wow ! Department of State gets a notice out LESS THAN 4 months after we reported this. What progress!Sigh.
“Notice: Colombia’s revised procedures for determining children’s eligibility for intercountry adoption
Colombia’s Institute for Family Welfare (ICBF) recently announced revised procedures for determining a child’s eligibility for intercountry adoption, which may affect some adoptions involving U.S. families. This process is known in Colombia as the “re-establishment of rights.” ICBF implemented these new procedures as a result of a November 2011 Constitutional Court ruling that ICBF was not fully considering the rights of, and opportunities for placement with, biological and extended families before placing a child for domestic or intercountry adoption.
To comply with the Constitutional Court decision, ICBF has been reviewing approximately 1,300 declarations of adoptability to ensure they meet the revised procedures. ICBF has identified a number of cases in which the adoption eligibility determination for a child does not meet the new standards. ICBF has placed an administrative hold on these cases until it is satisfied that the adoptability determination is evaluated as to whether there might be an extended family member who could care for the child. ICBF will notify prospective adoptive families that have been matched with children whose cases require evaluation. For privacy reasons, ICBF cannot inform the prospective adoptive families of the specific reasons for the review, and ICBF cannot offer any guarantee of the final outcome of the review.
As of September 2012, the U.S. Embassy in Bogota is aware of six instances involving U.S. families whose adoption proceedings required review; one adoption has since been finalized. These reviews represent a small percentage of the total number of intercountry adoptions between Colombia and the United States, and the Embassy continues to work with ICBF to encourage timely resolution. Families who learn that their adoption has been placed on hold should inform the U.S. Embassy in Bogota by contacting IVBogota@state.gov.
In addition to these formal reviews, both ICBF and the Colombian family court system appear to be scrutinizing proposed adoptions more carefully. Prospective adoptive families may experience delays while ICBF evaluates a family’s suitability before finalizing the match with an available child. The issuance of the adoption decree by a family court judge may also take longer than in the past. Families should anticipate spending six to eight weeks in Colombia to obtain the final adoption decree. Given these delays, the Embassy strongly advises all families with less than three months’ validity left on USCIS fingerprint results to make arrangements with USCIS (NBC.Hague@dhs.gov) to update these before traveling to Colombia to complete the adoption.”
Update 3/November 15, 2012
Judicial strike causes a hold for foreign adoptions. 120 are on hold until the strike ends.
“Claims for adoption of Colombian children have come to a halt as hopeful foreign couples have to wait for a strike within the justice system to be resolved, newspaper El Espectador reported Wednesday.
A spokeperson for a French adoption organization told the newspaper around 120 families have been unable to legalize adoption applications because of the strike.
“Families have been unable to obtain the rulings of adoption and have not been able to go to their home countries … they can not leave the country, they will not leave without their children.” expressed Schattka.
The spokewoman requested that “priority be given to these proceedings, to prompt judges to have on their desks procedures and ruling requests, to speak out so that these families can go home.”
‘120 adoptions on hold due to Colombia judicial strike’
[Colombia Reports 11/14/12 by Rob Edmond]
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