SPUNNING INTO CONTROL: MILES HARRISON HIRES HIGH PROFILE DEFENSE ATTORNEY PETER D. GREENSPUN

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This morning’s Washington Post reports that the Fairfax County Grand Jury could indict Miles Harrison on manslaughter charges as early as today. Harrison, reportedly suffering from nervous collapse at the scene of Dmitry/Chase’s death, later upgraded to a heart attack, remains in a private psychiatric hospital and has not been arrested. Herndon authorities agreed not to serve Harrison with a manslaughter warrant until his release, but Friday Fairfax Commonwealth’s Attorney Raymond F. Morrogh said they can’t hold off indefinitely. In the meantime, Herdon police have removed computers, a backpack, prescriptions, life insurance policies and Dmitry’s adoption information from the Harrison’s home and are re-checking information from interviews taken earlier. Miles Harrison has retained high profile Fairfax attorney Peter D. Greenspun to represent him. Greenspun previously defended Washington DC Sniper John Allen Muhammud, sports announcer Marv Albert, and Potomac, Maryland civic leader and “internet child predator” Rabbi David A Kaye.The April 2002 Washingtonian rated Greenspun the 14th best lawyer in Washington, DC, just below Ken Starr (#7), Monica Lewinsky’s attorney Plato Cocheris (#9) and Robert Bork (#13). A year and a half later, the Washingtonian named Greenspun one of the top 30 lawyers in the Washington DC metro area (#10) and Continue Reading →

BLOGGER BOOKMARK: BABY LOVE CHILD

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Just a quick note! Since mid-June Baby Love Child has been doing a tremendous amount work on adoption news horrors. She has published a veritable bibliography of online resources on Enna Baretto, Dmitry Yakolev/Chase Harrington, Judith Leekin, and the latest Guatemala adoption scandal. She is the only bastard blogger to my knowledge to pick up on Andrea Curry-Demus, the woman in the Pittsburgh area accused over the weekend of murdering a pregnant woman for her soon-due-baby. And then BLC analyzes–something much needed in the adoption blogosphere where cut and paste often passes for blogging. She puts the pieces together. BLC‘s blog is a tremendous resource for activists, researchers, the press, and us just plain bastard folks who are trying to get a handle on the never-end spew of adopta–nightmares rolling out daily. Just go over there and scroll around.I also highly recommend BLC’s July 10 entry ARD: For Those Going to N’awlins: In part she writes:The city is at this very moment a place where matters of survival are still paramount to so many. A protracted battle where the future of the city is being decided in many cases, not by the neighborhoods, but by those who can tear them Continue Reading →

HEGEL SMILES: NEBRASKA’S NO FAULT DUMP

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This is worth a second blog. From today’s Omaha World-Herald: LINCOLN — Nebraska hospitals have no clue who they might find on their doorsteps when the state’s unique “safe haven” law goes into effect Friday. It could be fragile newborns left by frightened and desperate young women. Or it could be unruly teenagers dropped off by frustrated parents. It looks like the folks at the Nebraska Children’s Home Society aren’t too pleased about it: Karen Authier, executive director of the Nebraska Children’s Home Society adoption agency, (NOTE: a longtime vocal opponent of legal baby dumps) worries that such predictions are too optimistic. She said her agency and others already have gotten disturbing calls from people talking about using the new law to drop off children who are more than a year old. If they follow through, she said, their children could be badly traumatized by the experience. “I hope this bill isn’t misused,” Authier said. “Because it’s written so broadly, it could be misinterpreted as encouraging people to abandon children.”Sen. Pete Pirsch, the bill’s sponsor admits that the laws takes a “unique approach,” and “To me, the important thing was to get through a safe haven bill,” said Pirsch, adding Continue Reading →

NEBRASKA SAFE HAVEN LAW: TIRED OF YOUR KID?

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You’ll all be glad to know that Nebraska’s “Baby” Safe Haven law goes into effect today. Note the quotation marks. They’re important. Unlike every other state that puts an age limit on dumping (3 days, 7 days, 1 month) the Nebraska legislature gives desperate killer parents a break. Nebraskans can dump their resident juvenile-of- any-age, as long as it’s done in a politically correct manner –at a hospital. Unfortunately turning Biff and Buffy over to the cops will still get Mom and Dad a stay in the GrayBar Hotel. This isn’t new news. I wrote about Nebraska’s odd safe haven take previously in Nebraska’s New Baby Dump Law: Better than Ritilan. You can read the poorly written law here. Read the KETV-Omaha report to get the full absurdity and ramifications: The new law that takes effect Friday says that any individual can leave a minor with a hospital employee without fear of being charged with abandonment.”Then it becomes a nurturing, supportive, helpful atmosphere versus criminal neglect or abuse-type atmosphere,” Chambers said. (Deb Chambers is , the director of the Family Birth Center.)… …The new law says anyone under the age of 19 can be dropped at a hospital. Hospital staff Continue Reading →

WHEN DID THE RUSSIANS KNOW? ANOTHER UPDATE ON DMITRY YAKOLEV/CHASE HARRISON

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New information on Dmitry Yakolev/Chase Harrison was published in the Russian press today. The English language online edition of Komsomolskaya Pravda fills in some details of Dima’s history prior to his transport to the US–and in a few short words tells us something about the care of women and children in post Soviet Russia (something I could write more on, but won’t at this time). It also contradicts somewhat an earlier report in the Russian language Gazetta that authorities had been unable to place Dima domestically due to a “series of serious diseases.” Moreover (not mentioned in the article), the placing agency, European Adoption Consultants is a major Adoption Russian Style money generator, and if the orphanage director had the chance to pick up a hefty “donation” from the Harrisons, its Russian customers would be shown the door. According to Komsomolskaya Pravda: Dima had made a long journey from Russia’s Pechor Pskovsk region to the U.S. His new family lived in Herndon, Virginia outside Washington DC. First, it seemed that fate had dealt the boy a second chance. His biological mother had put him up for adoption immediately after his birth — even though she too was raised in an Continue Reading →

ANOTHER RUSSIAN UPDATE: DIMA YAKOLEV/CHASE HARRISON

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The English language Moscow Times reported four hours ago that European Adoption Consultants, contrary to earlier news reports in RPC News and Gazetta, has not been banned from operating in the Russian Federation. (see Forever Family–Forever Dead memorial blog below.) The agency, however, is under investigation over its failure to immediately report the death last week of Dmitry Yakolev (adopted name Chase Harrison) in Virginia. The Moscow Times also said that the accreditation of two other agencies, The Cradle of Hope Adoption Center and Family and Children’s Agency has been withdrawn over failure to keep the Russian Education and Science Ministry informed on the well-being of adoptees placed by them as required by Russian law. Vladimir Kabanov, head of the ministry’s adoption department denied that the agencies were connected to the Yakolev/Harrison case, saying they are guilty of separate violations. EAC director Margaret Cole refused to comment as did officials from the other agencies. Having spent a lot of time in Russia myself, I was curious at the speed in which the ministry had reportedly booted EAC. Usually the apparatchiki grinds as slow as a babushka picks through the rynok. It’s hearening to know that the ministry is on top Continue Reading →

RUSSIAN UPDATES

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I have updated Forever Family – Forever Dead to include new information on Chase Harrison, including his original name and place of adoption. If more information becomes available I’ll add it. I have also updated information on the Jessica Albina Hagmann case. Thanks to the hard work of Niels, more is known about her death now–and the incredible decision of the judge who let her adopter walk with probation. Go here. And feel free to leave comments there or here.

ANOTHER RUSSIAN ADOPTEE DIES: CHASE HARRISON

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Another Russian adoptee has died, this time in Herdon, Virginia. Yesterday, Chase Harrison, 21 months, of Purcellville, died after being left in his adoptive father’s Yukon for “several hours.” (here, here, and here. ) The father, Miles, Harrison, 49, was supposed to drop the boy off at daycare, but drove to work instead, “forgetting” that the boy was in the car. Chase was discovered around 5:00 PM last night when a co-worker reported he saw something in Harrison’s SUV. (The windows are tinted.) Yeterday’s temperature reached 91 degrees. According to a study from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the temperature inside the Yukon would have ranged from 131-172 degrees. Miles Harrison, is the managing relocation manager for Project Solutions Group. He collapsed in the parking lot and has been hospitalized since Chase was pronounced dead. Police expect to charge him with manslaughter, which carries as much as a 10 year prison term. The adoptive mother, Carol Harrison, 45, is not implicated. They have no other children. Chase was adopted three months ago, but no further information on the adoption has been released. GO TO NOBODY IS FORGOTTEN–NOTHING IS FORGOTTEN FOR A COMPENDIUM OF ALL MY POSTS ON THE Continue Reading →

BASTARDETTE TO NCFA: SAVE ADOPTION FROM THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION!

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George W Bush opposes adoption! According to today’s Washngton Post, the White House is threatening to veto a change in the Federal Employees Paid Parental Leave Act that would permit federal and congressional employees to receive four weeks of paid parental leave after birth, adoption, or taking in a foster a child. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the expanded benefits would cost $850 million between the second half of 2009 and 2013 — about $105 per federal employee per year. It’s “costly and unnecessary” according to Bush’s social welfare and family values brain. Unlike, say, the Iraq War, the War on Terror and TSA. The bill passed the House 278 to 146 with 50 Republicans voting for and one Democrat voting against it. A companion bill is in the Senate. RED ALERT:NCFA’s Tom Terrific Atwood should pitch his tent on the White House lawn on this one. Unless this bill passes and is signed into law, thousands of newborns will remain unadopted–victms of the brutish anti-adoption Bush administration.