Articles labeled: baby trafficking

We’ve always wondered less about the people that sell babies than those that *buy* them. Who does that? How do you explain it to the neighbors?

“Hey, Linda, I see you got a new Hispanic baby there.”

“Oh, yeah, well, we, uh, found him at Wal-Mart and decided to keep him. Gotta go!”

Amado Torres, 64, of Harlingen, Texas, and his 25-year-old wife Maria Isabel Hernandez are suspected of buying more than a dozen children aged 2 or younger, officials say.

Investigator Oralia Mancha said the child trafficking ring came to light when a woman came to a police station in Reynosa on Monday to report her granddaughter missing, spotted Torres there and claimed he had the baby.

Police later arrested Torres and Hernandez after finding them with the baby at a house in nearby Rio Bravo.

An investigation revealed that babies bought from poor mothers and then sold on the black market in Malaysia were adopted out illegally. Prospective adoptive parents paid about $6,000 for the children, while the mothers received little more than $225.

Who knows what kind of families adopted these babies. Some with the purest intentions we’re sure, but some may have just wound up in the homes of pedophiles. Scary.

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) — Malaysian police have broken a baby-selling racket in southern Johor state, seizing four infants and detaining 23 people including a doctor and a government registrar, reports said Sunday.

The New Straits Times said the syndicate bought babies from poor women who were talked out of having abortions, and then sold them to childless couples.

It said police were investigating how many children were sold, and whether any went to Singaporean couples.