Colombian Adoptee Reunites with Mother

“Decades after she was stolen and sold to an adoption agency in Colombia, a Minnesota woman has been reunited with her birth mother, FOX 9 reports.

The station says Marisa Bocanegra, 37, met her mother via Skype Wednesday.

Feeling empty not knowing her true identity, Bocanegra says she started searching for her birth mother a few years ago via social media, joining a Facebook group called Adopted in Colombia. From there, FOX 9 says, she hired a private investigator who tracked down her mother in Bogota, Colombia.

The investigator found that Bocanegra’s birth mother was drugged and tricked into signing her infant daughter away when the child was a few hours old, the station says.

Bocanegra was eventually adopted by a family in Burnsville. The woman, who has children of her own and is a mentor for the deaf in Minnesota, was overcome by emotion when she saw her birth mother for the very first time.

“I’m so happy – my whole heart is full right now,” Bocanegra tearfully told FOX 9. “My dream has come true.”

Bocanegra, who is deaf in one ear, signed “I love you” to her mother on the screen. She could not hear her mother during the Skype session because the audio on her device was not working.

Bocanegra says she will go to visit her mother in Bogota this summer. A crowdfunding campaign is underway to help the woman cover her costs.”

Minnesota woman sees mom 37 years after being stolen as infant [Bring Me the News 4/24/14 by Tim Lammers]

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