Stolen from her family in Guatemala: adopted by Quebecers, she discovered that she had been the victim of a child trafficking network

Stolen from her family in Guatemala when she was only a few hours old, a young woman adopted by a Quebec couple recently discovered, after finding her biological mother, that she had been the victim of a vast network. of child trafficking.

“I was really angry when I found out. I didn’t understand how it could have happened here, in Quebec, and it wasn’t that long ago […]“, protests Marjorie Normandin, now 30 years old.

Several illegal adoptions of children took place in this Central American country during the civil war that raged there, specifically in the 1980s and 1990s. Thus, hundreds, even thousands of babies were taken from their mothers without their consent.

The network was well put together, since Marjorie’s adoptive parents in Quebec suspected nothing. Everything seemed to be in order, while the adoption documents are signed and authenticated by the Guatemalan government authorities.

But the Lost Roots Foundation, which helps Guatemalans find their biological families, revealed the existence of several fraudulent schemes during these adoptions (see other text).

Find your roots

It was in 2018, after a first trip to her native country, that Marjorie had the desire to find her biological family.

After years of fruitless research, this time she returns to her hometown, Guatemala City. She posts her own photos there in an effort to find her mother.

Her work bears fruit, since a few months later, a woman who claims to be her mother contacts her on the internet via Messenger. The 56-year-old, who now lives in the United States, tells him she has six half-brothers and half-sisters.

“At first, I didn’t believe it. I asked her a bunch of questions, and the dates and names matched my adoption file,” says Marjorie.

Then, a DNA test confirms that it is indeed his biological mother.

“From there, I started calling her mum. It’s still difficult for me to put emotions on all that, let’s say that it tumbled, ”says Marjorie, social worker in Montreal. As for his biological father, he would have died, according to information held by his mother.

Last August, she decided to go visit her mother in person, in North Carolina. She also met her three half-sisters there. “It was a lot, let’s say it was roller coaster emotions,” says the young woman.

But the story of her birth that her mother tells her upsets her.

Abducted after childbirth

“She told me that she gave birth to me, then I spent the whole day with her, then, in the evening, nurses came to fetch me to give me tests and blood tests. But I was never brought back,” she says.

Born as Marjorie Lopez in December 1992, she was then adopted by a Quebec couple six months later, with the help of a Guatemalan lawyer and notary named Susana Gonzalez Munoz.

It is then in a hotel room, designated by M^me Gonzalez Munoz, whom his adoptive parents went to receive their baby, in June 1993.

“My adoptive mother had heard about her by word of mouth,” says Marjorie. “They paid for, according to what they knew, which represented the lawyer’s fees, etc.,” she adds, adding that her adoptive parents never doubted the legality of the adoption.

A few years earlier, the lawyer had made headlines in The Journal of Montreal regarding reports on the adoption of children from Guatemala. In an article published in March 1987, she denied the possible existence of a child trafficking network.

Mystery

Moreover, between her birth at the San Juan de Dios hospital and her adoption six months later, Marjorie has no clues that would allow her to know where she lived and under what conditions.

A “great mystery” that she wishes to elucidate today. “My mother asked questions to find out where I was, but no one ever told her anything,” she said.

other encounters

In recent months, Marjorie has also traveled to her mother’s native village in Guatemala, Asuncion Mita, where she met her extended family.

“Everyone was waiting for me, everyone was looking forward to seeing me. It was special, since these are people I don’t know, but they were waiting for me,” she says with emotion. She plans to return there at the end of the summer.

At least thirty Quebecers adopted in Guatemala in the 1980s and 1990s are actively looking for their biological family, in order to find out the exact circumstances of their adoption.

This is affirmed by the Lost Roots Foundation, which helps them.

Since its founding in 2018, the organization has accompanied more than 500 people of Guatemalan origin – adopted by Europeans, Americans and Canadians – in their quest for truth.

The coordinator of the foundation in Quebec, Juana Laurin, notably helped Marjorie Normandin to find her roots.

“We are aware, during our research, that it is a shock for the adoptee, but also for the biological family. You have to be careful and delicate, since it’s a bit like opening a wound,” says the 37-year-old woman, also illegally adopted from Guatemala.

After reuniting with her biological mother herself in June 2021, she learned that she had been placed for adoption without her parents’ consent. It was during a hospitalization, at the age of 8 months, that she was removed.

While visiting Quebec with her daughter, Juana’s mother told the Log going through a whole range of emotions in the months and years that followed. She also claims that she will never be able to recover. “All the time I was sad. There was nothing I could do, I had no information, ”says Virginia Escobar, now 58, on the phone.

Adoption denounced

In recent years, many reports on these illegal adoptions in Guatemala have been published, among others on Radio-Canada, which has helped to “get things moving”, says the founder of Roots Lost, Coline Fanon, born in Guatemala in 1986 under the name of Mariela SR. The woman, who prefers to conceal her surname for security reasons, multiplies the steps and public outings to make her story known.

Collective memory

Even today, there is a long way to go, she says.

M^me Fanon would particularly like the Canadian and Quebec governments to recognize the existence of this network of child trafficking that took place in his native country. “It’s a duty of collective memory,” she says.

Abducted

Aged 37, the Belgian mother, of Guatemalan origin, was also torn from her mother’s arms when she was only 2 days old.

“I had a fever and my mother too. I was supposedly transferred to the neonatology unit for treatment, and then I disappeared,” says Ms.^me Dewlap.

Adopted by a Belgian couple when she was 11 months old, M^me Fanon learned her “true story” in 2017, after reuniting with her biological mother.

“We [le personnel hospitalier] told my mother that I was dead and that I had been taken to a mass grave,” she said.

Tied to a bed

After extensive research, she also learned that for the 11 months prior to her adoption in Europe, she had been living in conditions of confinement, in a clandestine nursery. “There were inhumane acts and inhumane conditions. I was with other children, tied to a bed,” she describes.

According to the organization, nearly 4,000 children may have been illegally adopted in Guatemala, including hundreds by Canadian parents.

“There have been illegal adoptions, not all of them are, but the majority are,” says Ms.^me Dewlap.

Extensive network

“There are all sorts of stories, whether it’s victims from massacre areas or war wounded, children stolen from hospitals, or even false records of abuse that led to the withdrawal of parental authorities. […]. The identities, places of birth, ages and places are also sometimes changed […]. There were several networks and some had connections”, lists M^me Dewlap.

Quebec has been closed to adoptions of Guatemalan children since 2001.