3 Convicted in Argentine Adoption Trial

[Guildenstern]

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina - A court on Friday sentenced the adoptive parents of a baby born to a missing political prisoner to up to eight years in prison for concealing the child's identity, in a landmark case with roots in Argentina's dictatorship.

The court also handed down a sentence of 10 years to a former army captain accused of giving the couple the baby after the real parents were abducted by state security forces during the 1976-1983 military regime and never reappeared.

The case marked the first time a child of a dissident who disappeared during Argentina's "dirty war" had taken her adoptive parents to court. Human rights groups say more than 200 such children were taken from abducted mothers and given to military or politically connected families to raise. DNA tests have allowed some of them to identify their real parents.

The court sentenced Osvaldo Rivas and his former wife, Maria Cristina Gomez Pinto, to eight years and seven years in prison, respectively, for falsifying documents and concealing the identity of a minor. The former captain, Enrique Berthier, received 10 years.

Source: Yahoo! News
Full Article: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080405/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/argentina_dirty_war_adoption

These people kidnapped a child, hid the truth from her, probably abducted and tortured her parents, knowingly kept her apart from her family, always lied to her about her true origins, ill-treated and humiliated her. I think such people can’t really feel filial love and respect.

[Adrian II]

These people kidnapped a child, hid the truth from her, probably abducted and tortured her parents, knowingly kept her apart from her family, always lied to her about her true origins, ill-treated and humiliated her. I think such people can’t really feel filial love and respect.Wasn't this part of a government program of the same sort?
Disgusting people.

[Furious Mental]

Yes, disgraceful accomplices to a disgraceful policy. Imprisonment is well deserved.

[Guildenstern]

However, this is the first time a child of a dissident from Argentina's "dirty war" takes her false adoptive parents to court. Hopefully Argentina's people started throwing some light upon those terrible years.

[Fragony]

What if the adoption parents really loved her, can't think of a more poetic justice. That has to make you think about what you did.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

These people kidnapped a child

That's a point of view. If you're talking about the officer implicated, then yes, he did. If you're talking about the parents, it's not as clearly cut.


hid the truth from her

Possibly. See below.


probably abducted and tortured her parents

You can't blame that on the adoptive parents. They just received the child, from what every news article I have read so far states.


knowingly kept her apart from her family

That is also possibly true. However,


Victor Enrique Valle, a lawyer for both Rivas and Pinto, said during the trial the adoptive parents "could have no way of knowing where their daughter came from."


ill-treated and humiliated her.

I haven't seen that mentioned. Perhaps a link to a site that does?

[Guildenstern]

@Evil_Maniac From Mars:
About the ill-treatment and humiliation, those are words said by the now-30-year-old kidnapped girl herself during the news conference she held on Monday. I read the news in an Italian article, so I thought it useless to post the link. But I have no problem to do that, if you still want me to do it.

Actually, I just reported what she said during her news conference. My fault, I should have pointed that out.

[Adrian II]

You can't blame that on the adoptive parents. They just received the child, from what every news article I have read so far states.Of course they knew, hence the conviction for 'falsifying documents' and 'hiding her identity'.

The perpetrators in this abduction ring knew what they were doing. This may be the first civil case as Guildenstern says, but it is not the first abduction case that has come to court: linky (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3585031.stm). That's how I first heard about it, I think.

Operation Condor, that's the name of the overall operation conducted by Pinochet's DINA, Galtieri's SIDE and various other Latin American secret services and death squads. The U.S. were heavily involved, too, as documented (http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB77/) and then documented again (http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB185/index.htm) by the State Department. The French were also involved through a 'military mission' consisting of some fine characters who previously fought in Algeria. The so-called 'death flights' that were used by Chile and Argentine to make bodies (and other evidence) disappear, seems to have been an old French 'tactic' from the Algerian War.

Nice to finally see some people convicted.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

Of course they knew, hence the conviction for 'falsifying documents' and 'hiding her identity'.

Yes, the child's identity was hidden, but were the adoptive parents of the child responsible for kidnapping and torturing the child's biological parents? I think not.

[Caius]

Yes, the child's identity was hidden, but were the adoptive parents of the child responsible for kidnapping and torturing the child's biological parents? I think not
They kidnapped the parents, tortured them, and the babies were given in adoption. Militars kidnapped them, militars received the sons. There is a probability they were.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

They kidnapped the parents, tortured them, and the babies were given in adoption.

Whether the adoptive parents did this, however...


There is a probability they were.

A probability.

[Guildenstern]

Yes, the child's identity was hidden, but were the adoptive parents of the child responsible for kidnapping and torturing the child's biological parents? I think not.
I think they are responsible for that too. I'm talking about moral responsibility here. As a matter of fact, they knowingly accepted the child of abducted and tortured people. Moreover, they hid the girl's identity and the truth, and in this way they contributed to keep the tortures of her parents a secret.

[Papewaio]

So what was the other recourse?

Kill the child too?
Adopt, tell them when they were teenagers and then live in mortal fear?


200+ Adopted.
Is there something about being a facist that inhibits the ability to procreate?

[Furious Mental]

Didn't know? The rationale for these adoptions was that if the child was given to the family of its dead leftist parents it would be brought up as a leftist. Candidates for these adoptions were privy to a deliberate government program and were all themselves ideological supporters of the regime and, in the case of the men, members of the coercive apparatus.

[Banquo's Ghost]

200+ Adopted.
Is there something about being a facist that inhibits the ability to procreate?

Yeah. Your genes might reveal some flaw and then you'd get your shiny boots taken away.

[Guildenstern]

So what was the other recourse?
Kill the child too?
Adopt, tell them when they were teenagers and then live in mortal fear?

The only right choice for the false parents was not to take part in the fascist parents-abduction/child-adoption scheme.
I think their fault began at the very moment when they accepted the baby.