We will follow this to the end. We’ve committed to bringing facts to light in this case and Veronica’s return to the Capobiancos, at least to us, does not mean an end. This case will go on to affect other children and other cases. So in that vein, we bring you more of the story.  We ask that the reader please excuse the long, meandering nature of today’s post. We have so much information we’d like to bring you that it’s difficult to be as concise as we’d like and more facts are coming forth daily.

In the months leading up to what was to be the finalization of the Capobiancos adoption of Veronica, we were told that the Capobiancos would  go to Oklahoma to facilitate the most loving and caring transition of Veronica as humanly possible. They made sure to leak that transition plan online. And that plan called for a week long transition with Veronica spending less time with her father and more time with the Capobiancos as the week progressed. The psychologist who put that together did seem to sympathize with the situation and seems to have given the situation considerable thought but remarked that the damage would still be done to the child regardless. She also noted that the best they could do would be to redirect or distract by giving her a cookie in hopes that she would get past the hurt and soon forget what would happen to her.

That transition plan can be found here.

But as we’ve maintained from the start, there HAD to be more to this. If the Capobiancos were going to go to Oklahoma to get Veronica, then why was Brown in hot water for not showing up that Sunday with the child in South Carolina? The initial transition plan and their statements made no mention of Brown making any appearance in South Carolina.

Well we’re afraid our suspicions were correct. In fact, court documents show that while the Capobiancos led us to believe they were this loving couple willing to do anything to assure the comfort and well being of this child, they in fact submitted a second, surreptitious transition plan to the courts. This transfer plan was far less concerned with Veronica’s state of mind or her reaction to being taken from her father. In fact, aside from one visit at the attorney’s office, this plan basically called for a two day transition with Brown being available an additional day at their disposal should his presence be needed to smooth things over with Veronica and make her more compliant. It also stated the transition was to happen in their home with Brown on their turf and presumably much more controllable given he’d be in their state.

We were lied to. We were duped. AND if we were lied to about this, what else were we lied to about? Via the testimony posted on this site, you can see we were lied to by birth mother and the Capobiancos with regard to Brown having any knowledge of the adoption. Birth mother’s testimony also was not in line with her earlier depositions.  At various points, many of them were impeached during the family court hearing.  We’ve also heard from the psychologist, Jan Hunt, who said she was duped by their Guardian Ad Litem into reporting favorably for them while being given incorrect information on which to base her report.  And now we see we were lied to on this issue as well. And with Brown’s hearing for extradition on the parental kidnapping charges looming and now the news of their recent suit against him, could we again be being led astray here?

THE MONEY

According to Michael Overall with Tulsa World late last week, the Capobiancos are also now suing Brown for attorneys fees and costs for their trip to Oklahoma.  He reportedly had a copy of the documents filed September 9th and adamantly noted it was the Capobiancos rather than the courts who initiated the suit. However, the couple insist they were not the ones initiating the suit, the South Carolina courts were.  (Overall’s piece has since been taken down although as you can see here and here, other outlets covered the same issue.) We have to ask ourselves, with such an extensive history of lies, are we wise to believe then that courts are suing on their behalf and this suit isn’t being brought forth by them? Weren’t they also the ones who reminded us very early on that one cannot sue for the benefit of another? (This was their argument early on when they maintained Brown was only trying to get Veronica back for his parents. We were told he could not sue for custody on behalf of another. This was their argument with respect to the initial Oklahoma suit as Brown requested his parents look after the child while he was deployed.)

*We will have more on the money issues associated with this case in the future.

THE JUDGE

This order finalizing the couple’s adoption of Veronica also brings forth a strong point and again, another lie. We were told early on that Brown signed his parental rights away and that it’s only now that he wants to change his mind. He’s a dead beat for doing so and as such he is not entitled to his biological child.  We then have to ask, if he signed his rights away, why then was it necessary for the South Carolina family courts to terminate his rights? We’ve been lied to again it seems. Many knew all along and documents attest to the fact that Brown did NOT sign his parental rights away. And we also know Maldonado admitted that Brown had no idea of her plans to put the child up for adoption.

We also point out that a quick internet search reveals two things with respect to Judge Martin of South Carolina: 1. that he has a history of being a subpar judge with a questionable history there and 2., there are allegations that Martin has had prior dealings or was familiar with the Capobianco family prior to this case. In his Enforcement Order of August 5th, it seems rather obvious to the reader Martin seemed to have a personal stake in this and was upset that he’d been named a defendant in a suit filed days earlier in this case. It would seem he had trouble differentiating between his personal emotions and South Carolina adoption law and, based on other online articles, that he has a long history of allowing his anger to override his making legal, moral and ethical decisions.

Initially Martin pressed for Custodial Interference charges on Brown. After some thought, it appears he realized he’d made some sort of procedural mistake. He then decided that what should have happened was a contempt of court charge instead. Oddly though, the Custodial Interference charges were not dropped but the contempt charges were added on instead. And while it’s well within the courts judgement to issue fines in conjunction with almost all charges, the one part of this being pursued by the courts rather than the Capobiancos are fines for each day Mr. Brown had his daughter beyond the date of their adoption being finalized. That definitely appears to be a judge whose anger has overridden good judgement and gone to a personal level so much so that not only is the punishment of losing his child not enough, Brown must also lose his freedom and finances too.

There are also some who will say well, what was Martin supposed to do? The South Carolina Supreme Court left him no option. As an officer of the courts, Martin’s job is to uphold justice. Veronica’s rights were violated. She was not given a best interest hearing.  Objections were brought up with regard to other documents being amiss too. Martin flat out refused to even consider those objections citing his being instructed by the higher court to ignore all other issues and simply PUSH THIS ADOPTION THROUGH! But Martin in his role as defender of justice could have done what was right rather than what was ordered.  And he did so without ever even protesting. In fact, he seemed more than happy to be finalizing this adoption and terminating Brown’s parental rights. Being ordered to do so is never an excuse for doing the wrong thing.

SPECIAL NEEDS

But the absolute most important issues aside from all of this are that Veronica and her feelings were given no thought in this, that we were lied to in that they had a second plan up their sleeve that also disregarded Veronica’s emotions and that Veronica was declared to be a ‘special needs’ child based solely on her race. I’ve asked many in the field of adoption and foster care why this is. What’s that have to do with anything? Well, in foster placements, states are awarded much more money for the care of special needs children than they are for average children. And in the Dakotas especially, this is an overused excuse for the state to step in and take Native children at alarming rates for little to no reason. It’s nothing more than a way to boost revenues in an already overburdened child welfare system. However, in adoption, there are adoption tax credits to be had. And while I’m still not sure of the specifics, I’ve been led to believe that when adopting a child with special needs, these credits could be ongoing.  A quick check of this online states that couples adopting a special needs child at the very least are entitled to take the full deduction without having to document their adoption expenses which leaves us also to wonder then if there is any merit to stories Maldonado was paid for the child…an expense one could not legally document.