Three girl adopted from foster care by Gary Patrick McCoy were sexually abused by him. McCoy had adopted seven children. McCoy received three sentences between 17 year and 5 and months and 35 years and is currently incarcerated at Earnest C. Brooks Correctional Facility. McCoy had once received the foster parent of the year award.

17-year-old boy adopted by Wilson and Brenda Sullivan, was found caged in a crib and weighing 49 pounds by the Ohio state Department of Children and Families . Wilson Sullivan died in the middle of the trial. Brenda Sullivan got 20 years imprisonment.

   
8 year old boy adopted by Samuel and Donna Merryman. Died after suffering cardiac arrest brought on by starvation. He weighed 37 pounds, 2 lbs less than his weight at adoption. Both adoptive parents were arrested and charged with manslaughter and first degree child abuse resulting in death and reckless endangerment. He was adopted along with his older brother and 2 older sisters from Ochyor, Perm region, Russia almost 5 years before.

9-year-old girl adopted by David Charles Gilmore and his wife Karen, was sexually abused by her adoptive father. The Gilmore's had four biological children under the age of 10 and three children adopted from Russia. Gilmore was a music teacher and a former Friends (Quaker) youth pastor. Gilmore is serving 30 years.

Five children adopted by the Dollars who starved them, shocked them with electricity, pulled out their toenails with pliers, bound them with chains and strips of plastic and struck their feet with hammers. Twin boys, age 14, weighed 36 and 38 pounds when taken from the home.

The family included three girls, ages 12, 13 and 17; three 14-year-old boys (two of them twins) and a 16-year-old boy. One 14 yr old and the 17 year old were favorites and not abused. Dollar's also had an adult daughter, adopted as an infant, who had moved out of the home.

  

7-year-old boy adopted by Carole Ann DeLeon was severely dehydrated and weight only 28 pounds at the time of his death. Official cause of death was dehydration. While living in Wyoming, Carol Ann DeLeon had already had three children removed from her home because of child abuse. Tyler and his foster brother told teachers they were abused by DeLeon and her adult daughter Christina Burns-DeLeon. The school called CPS several times.

16 month old Serena died of blunt force trauma to her head in 2003. Adoptive mother Tonya Grizzard Cate was charged with capital murder in 2005. The father was not charged. The case has not gone to trial yet.

5-year-old girl to be adopted by Ernest Richard Davison and Cynthia Joan Davison, had been bound at her wrists and ankles for a considerable time and was suffering from malnourishment. She has Down's Syndrome. There were 3 other special needs adopted and foster children in the home.

Heta Nua (aka Heta Sioka) dies due to neglest in FOC nanny house in Samoa. She was undernourished, and a skin infection and a respiratory tract infection. Focus on Children has convinced her parents to place Heta and her brother in the nanny house to facilitate an international adoption. Mother Avea Nua said she wanted a good future for her children Semi and Heta. Believing they would be cared for by a family who shared their Mormon faith, then returned home, the Nuas agreed to surrender the children to Focus on Children. It is unlikely her parents knew the western meaning of adoption.

Karen Banks and Coleen Bartlett of FOC were briefly detained in Samoa after Heta's death.

 

3 children, 1 adopted and 2 fostered by Eunice Spry were abused over 20 years. The children were beaten, starved, forced to eat vomit, had sticks rammed down their throats, skin rubbed with sandpaper and were locked naked in their rooms for weeks. Spry was convicted in 2007.