Teenage Mexican mum caught up in Irish adoption scandal tells her story

15-year-old duped into parting with her baby

A 15-year-old Mexican mother has revealed how she was duped into parting with her baby by the child trafficking ring at the heart of an Irish adoption scandal.

Karla Zepeda was offered $755 for a two week photo shoot with her tiny baby girl when a woman was approaching mothers in her poor neighbourhood looking for babies to photograph in an anti-abortion ad campaign.

The teenager could barely believe her ears. Earning just $180 a month at a sandwich stand, the offer equated to riches beyond her wildest dreams.

Little did Karla know that her nine-month-old daughter, Camila, was wanted for more than photographic poses in the Mexican city of Guadalajara.

---------------------

Read more:

Irish couples return home from Mexico after child adoption nightmare

IrishCentral’s top Irish baby names for boys and girls

Archaeologists uncover mystery of over-zealous priest, fairies and a buried pagan cross

---------------------

Instead, she was left for weeks at a time with an Irish couple at a hotel in nearby Ajijic who believed they were about to complete the process to adopt little Camila.

The scam is just typical of the stories that have emerged since Mexican police smashed the illegal adoption ring and questioned 11 Irish parents caught up in the nightmare scenario.

Local officials have told Fox News how Karla was just one of many desperately poor mothers lured into the sordid trade by the gang who are now under investigation.

Already, Camila and nine other children have been turned over to state officials who suspect they were being groomed for illegal adoptions and the authorities fear that far more children could be involved in a scam that has been ongoing for 20 years.

Lead investigator Blanca Barron told reporters that nine people have been detained while four of the children may have been victims of sexual abuse, though authorities gave no details on how or by whom.

The Associated Press reports that for Karla Zepeda, the story began in August, when she was approached by Guadalupe Bosquez and agreed to lend her daughter for an anti-abortion advertising campaign.

Bosquez then returned with another woman, Silvia Soto, and gave her half the money as they picked the child up. Karla received the balance of the cash two weeks later when they brought Camila home.

“They showed me a poster that showed my girl with other babies and said ‘No To Abortion, Yes To Life,”‘ said Karla. “I thought it was legal because everything seemed very normal.”

​