Masha’s Story Reaction

MASHA SPEAKS--THE ADOPTION INDUSTRY BUNKERS IN: "DISNEY WORLD GIRL" AND THE SHAME OF COMPLICITY Holy Who's Your Daddy! Should we be surprised that the National Council for Adoption--or at least its member agencies and adoptocrat friends in high places--have spearheaded a campaign to censor the scheduled December 1 ABC Primetime feature on the Russian adoptee known as "Disney World Girl" who was grossly sexually abused by her "forever father"? From The Daily Bastardette - read the full post here . . .

Masha’s Story

Tomorrow night an extraordinary and unprecedented story will air on ABC Primetime about my client, a Russian orphan girl who was adopted by an American pedophile. When millionaire Matthew A. Mancuso adopted five year old Masha from a Russian orphanage, she had already lived a tragic life. Stabbed by her drunken mother at age three, Masha hoped for a better life in the United States. Instead she was sent to live near Pittsburgh with a pedophile who had a long history of abusing young girls. During the next five years, Mancuso sexually assaulted Masha almost daily while slowly starving her to keep her body thin and childlike. Some of the abuse was ...

Child Trafficking and International Adoption

Following the recent devastating earthquake, and concerned about the potential for child trafficking, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz ordered that all earthquake orphans be registered and taken into government care. None of them would be put up for adoption. In a grotesque way, international child trafficking and international adoption seem to have much in common, but one is an evil disease and the other is a welcome cure. The legitimate international adoption system may, in rare instances, be the vehicle through which trafficking takes place. Despite our best efforts to safeguard the system, the child traffickers, like criminals everywhe...

Individual Liability of Social Work Supervisors

Supervisors are often named as defendants in lawsuits even though they have no direct involvement in the event itself. Individuals alleging discrimination or other wrongful behavior in the workplace frequently sue both the agency and their supervisors. Such allegations may be made because plaintiffs seek to impute the supervisors’ actions to the agency. Notwithstanding such allegations, claims may also be made against supervisors in their individual capacities. Some state and federal laws prohibit plaintiffs from suing their supervisor in their individual capacity. In other circumstances, personal liability is a realistic result. For instance, ...

Lost in America

A young adopted Russian girl who appeared in a series of sexually explicit pictures taken at a Walt Disney World hotel was found and is now safe. Thirteen other Russian children adopted by American families over the past few years are not. They are dead. Though their numbers are small compared with the overall number of Russian Children adopted by Americans, the prevalence of their deaths within this sub-population of children, all due to child maltreatment by their adopted parent, is much higher than that for child abuse fatalities in the general American population. The Russian government, outraged by these deaths, is considering taking strong ...

Financial Accountability of Human Services Agencies

“Government Is Criticized On Oversight of Head Start,” March 18, 2005, New York Times “D.C.'s Anti-Poverty Agency Is Under Federal Scrutiny; Possible Fiscal Irregularities Questioned,” March 24, 2004, Washington Post “Ethics Charges Filed Against Top Officials Of Nassau Health Unit”, April 24, 2003, New York Times Three different headlines, but they all tell the same story -- supporting the functioning of human services organizations is a financial challenge. The work of these agencies, coupled with limited money, results in a pressing need for close attention to financial management. Frequent newspaper accounts of financial ...

Ethnic Cleansing in America

Americans don’t have to travel to Bosnia, South Africa or the West Bank to appreciate the legacy of ethnic cleansing, apartheid or aboriginal territorial disputes. Those injustices can be found right here at home in New York state. Yesterday, with barely any notice, the United States Supreme Court ruled that land recently purchased by Oneida Indians for economic development on the long recognized Oneida reservation can never again become sovereign Indian land. Invoking high minded but ultimately hollow legal principles like “laches, acquiescence, and impossibility,” the Court found that the national government’s indifference, ...

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