Russia bans 3 adoption agencies following baby's death in U.S.

I spent hours this weekend wading through Russian news paper articles to dig up more details about this case. The story broke before the above article was published. I believe the first publication was an article in the Washinton Post titled Va. Toddler Dies After Father Leaves Him in SUV, which was published last  Thursday. I had just added the case and a couple of American articles and was already working on three other cases that hit the news in the last couple of days, when someone mailed me the above article. The banning of three agencies was news to me, since it had not been mentioned in the American media and the article also contained the original name of the boy that was so grossly neglected, something not mentioned in any American news paper either. 

Though the article said three agencies were banned, it didn't say which agency, information I'd like to add to the case files we maintain. It so happened, the original name of the boy was the key to finding that out. Thanks to an online translation service I was able to translate his name into Cyrillic writing and with that started searching the Russian section of Google news. The first article I found did indeed mention one of the three banned agencies, European Adoption Consultants from Ohio, which was responsible for the placement of Chase/Dmitry but no mentioning of any home study agency.

In the mean time I had informed the Daily Bastardette in a comment on her blog about the placement agency involved, knowing that is typical information she maintains about the Russian murder cases as well. I noticed there was a heated debate going on whether this case deserved to be mentioned on the list of Russian adoptees killed by their adopters. There were proponents who blaimed the neglect entirely on wealthy people too self-absorbed to take proper care of their purchased goods and were now faced with a broken toy and there were opponents who said this was a tragic accident that unfortunately happens more often than not and cannot be ascribed to adoption. Faced with the debate I foolishly decided to add my one-and-a-half cent, so I wrote:

I've read quite a few comments now that say this case has nothing to do with adoption, which I think needs addressing.

I think there are two sides to this, a political and a personal.

On a political level, this has everything to do with adoption. Banning EAC from doing further business in Russia is a political decision made by the Russian Ministry of Education and Science and is entirely related to this case.

On a personal level it is much more difficult to establish a relation between adoption and the neglect taken place. Such is difficult to establish in all abuse/neglect/murder cases.

Only in cases where a family consists of natural and adoptive children and where the adoptive children are treated badly while the natural children don't, can we establish a relation between adoption and abuse/neglect/murder.

In all other cases such relation is hard and often impossible to establish. That doesn't mean those case that are not all that cut 'n dry should be excluded. As much as we can't assume the neglect would not have taken place had this not been an adopted child, we can't assume either this is a foolish, yet otherwise loving parent who would have done so had the child been a fruit of his own loins.

I hoped that would cool of the debate a little, but boy was I wrong with that, it only put more fuel on instead. Long story short, the list of comments is now 80 posts long and there will probably follow some more. I decided to step out of the debate after three posts, because I don't feed the trolls.

Today I decided to look again into the Russian articles and this time around found one that mentioned what looked like the home study agency involved. An automatic translation of that article brought up the following sentence.

The conclusion of the opportunity to be adoptive parents Harrison couple and a commitment to monitor the "living conditions and upbringing of the adopted child", according to the Ministry, has prepared a licensed clinical sotsrabotnik Agency Adoption Connections Christian Hessindzher in Virginia, USA.

Upon verification there indeed was an agency "Adoption Connections" in Virginia and the sentence indeed seemed to indicate they did the home study, which was later verified by a Russian member of PPL. Still I was confused about the "Christian Hessindzher" part. Sure many agencies are Christian, but what the heck is a Hessindzher? Fortunately our Russian member sent me a link to yet another Russian article, which contained the following sentence after automatic translation:

The conclusion of the opportunity to be adoptive parents and spouses Harrison obligation to monitor the living conditions and upbringing of the adopted child, as reported in Minobrnauki, produced Kristin K. Hessindzher, a licensed clinical social worker adoption agencies "Edopshn Konnekshenz" (Virginia).

So my first conclusion this was some sort of  Christian whatever had been completely wrong, this was the name of the social worker involved, someone by the name of Kristin Hessinger or something like that. A couple of Google rounds further, I found an article about a Christine Hessinger who wrote home studies for Adoption Connections in Virginia. With that my search for the parties responsible for the placement of Chase/Dmitry was finished.

I still don't know who the other two agencies are that were banned from Russia, but we'll probably hear more about that in the coming days. For now the Chase/Dmitry case can rest for a while until the trials begin and we will hear more about the circumstances surrounding his gruesome neglect.

Today the Washington Post had an update on the case of Chase/Dmitry. There was some information, that I believe wasn't covered before. It now seems Chase has been in the car for over 10 hours. His adoptive father left the house at 6:45 am on his way from Purceville to Herndon, which is about a 45 minute commute. At 5 pm that same day he was finally found in the car, by that time he was dead. So the poor boy must have been alone in that car for nine-and-a-half hours.

The attorney for the adoptive father said the following

"I have seen some pretty difficult and very tragic situations in 30 years of criminal defense practice," Greenspun said. "The sadness here is as bad as it gets for Mr. Harrison and his family and friends. This is a good man who has the unwavering support of his entire family. They are all dealing with their grief in this most difficult of times."

"Any suggestion of a motive is the exercise of wild imagination," Greenspun said. "This was an accident, a tragic accident. There was no motive of any sort, and any inference of that is absurd."

While it is an attorney's job to defend his client, the statement he made, resembles much of what I have read in comments on this case in the previous week and half. It seems on the one hand there are people wanting to claim this is merely an accident, while other's claim this to be murder. As it now seems this is in the least a situation of gross neglect, not an accident, but there is no indication so far this is a murder case either.

It is good to see the police is covering all basis and are investigating all angles of thise case

Herndon police have obtained a series of search warrants -- for Harrison's home, home computers, backpack and vehicle -- as part of their investigation. A warrant for Harrison's home computers indicated that Harrison had "made statements during interviews about prescriptions, life insurance policies and adoption information for the victim."

Detectives sought to examine the computers to verify or discredit Harrison's claims that he did not have a life insurance policy for his son, one police affidavit says.

Herndon police Lt. Jeff Coulter said he thought detectives were just "covering the bases and trying to get as much information as they can to determine whether this was accidental or intentional. It's a follow-up to cover those angles." He added that he did not think there was any indication of insurance playing a role in the case.

Somehow the case of Shawn Lowrance, whose adoptive parents took out a life insurance policy of $650,000 on him a year prior to his death, must have had some impact on law enforcement practices. At least now the police investigates these kind of possiblilties, while in Shawn's case it was the insurance company that, weeks later, reported their suspicions.

Wednesday last week services were held at St. Francis DeSales Roman Catholic Church of Purcellville for Chase/Dmitry followed by his interment in Ebenezer Cemetery, Round Hill, VA. The Fairfax Times reported about the funeral mass. 

There were a couple of remarks in the article that gave me the shivers:

It's not what we gave him but what he gave us,” said a family friend, who eulogized the smiley toddler with blond hair.

That indeed sums up the position of many adoptees, we are there to give. We are there to give meaning to a marriage, we are there to fulfill the wants and needs of our parents. All the while adoption should be about what can be given to a child. Had more attention been given to Chase/Dmitry, he would still have been alive. The same sentiment is reflected in a letter from Miles Harrison who couldn't attend, still being hospitalized at the time. He stated in his writing: Chase would “always be our perfect gift.”. Again the reversal of what should have been.

The eulogist also spoke of the “unconditional love” Chase's parents had for him.

How unconditional is someone's love when out of sight means out of mind? Unconditional is not just in good times or in bad times, but also in mundane times, in times when work and child-rearing go hand in hand.

There is also an online obituary in his name, which most disturbingly states:

In lieu of flowers, the family requests memorial contributions in memory of Chase to Project Sunshine, c/o European Adoption Consultants, Inc., 12608 Alameda Drive, Strongsville, OH 44149, USA, 440-846-9300.

So in the end everyone loses, except for the industry.