A horrific subculture of Facebook “adoption” groups was uncovered in a recent Reuters sting, in which adoptive and ostensibly negligent parents seek “re-homing” of actual human children in sometimes even worse than it sounds ways.
The Facebook adoption sting revealed a cross-network social media web of adoptive and foster parents discussing children living in their homes in a cold, detached, and horribly abusive manner in many cases, with several of the instances described involving legitimate adoptions in which children were very poorly placed.
The Reuters Facebook adoption investigation story is illustrated with an image of a woman named Nicole Eason, who the newswire says goes by the handles “Big Momma,” and “Momma Bear.” Reuters adds that her preferred phrasing to refer to “informal custody transfers is ‘non-legalized adoption,’ and she defines the phrase to mean: ‘Hey, can I have your baby?’ ”
One woman from Nebraska quoted in the story spoke of her adopted son from Guatemala, posting:
“I am totally ashamed to say it but we do truly hate this boy!”
A bit of digging on Eason and her partner by Reuters uncovered what appears to be damning evidence about the informal adoptions carried out using Facebook and similar services. The site reports that a girl named Quita was placed with the family when rudimentary sleuthing uncovered horrifying information:
“Child welfare authorities had taken away both of Nicole Eason’s biological children years earlier. After a sheriff’s deputy helped remove the Easons’ second child, a newborn baby boy, the deputy wrote in his report that the “parents have severe psychiatric problems as well with violent tendencies … The Easons each had been accused by children they were babysitting of sexual abuse, police reports show. They say they did nothing wrong, and neither was charged.”
After reporting that a single document of custodial fitness provided by the Easons was a forgery, Reuters adds:
“On Quita’s first night with the Easons, her new guardians told her to join them in their bed, Quita says today. Nicole slept naked, she says.”
In the course of the Facebook adoption sting, Reuters discovered more than 5,000 listings on a single messageboard off-site.
Actually it was mostly yahoo message boards that Reuters focuses on during the five year investigation,. Yahoo did close them citing TOS, however, Facebook claimed that the re-homing boards were not in violation of TOS according to the Reuters series. There were still some open post the publication of the Reuters piece, but the most obvious ones since then have shut down most likely due to other users reporting them. But they will come back.. they always do. I have screen shots of them here: https://www.adoptionbirthmothers.com/reuters-investigates-adoption-re-homing-abuses/
Facebook still hasn't figured out what "human trafficking" is and the big part they are playing in it. When you report a site to them, they don't even offer a box to "tick" to report it.