Spain's Stolen Baby Scandal Gets Its First Day in Court

By Wendy Gillis
Toronto Star
April 4, 2012

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/1156309--spain-s-stolen-baby-scandal-gets-its-first-day-in-court?bn=1

For nearly 30 years she kept the baby blanket and pacifier, hoping one day to return them to the daughter she claims was snatched from her at birth.

Now, Luisa Torres has not only reconnected with her lost child — the mother-daughter reunion has prompted the first indictment in the "stolen babies" scandal that has rocked Spain in recent months.

Torres and her daughter, 29-year-old Maria Pilar, appeared in a Madrid court Tuesday, testifying that Sister Maria Gomez Valbuena, a nun now in her 80s, orchestrated the theft of Pilar, then sold her to another family.

"Now the judge knows everything," Torres told reporters outside the Madrid court after her two-hour testimony. "I hope for justice."

Spanish prosecutors are now handling more than a thousand cases alleging the trafficking of newborns.

Between 1960 and 1989, it's reported that as many as 300,000 babies born in Spain were taken, then given away or sold by a ring of doctors, midwives, priests and nuns.

Some families were falsely informed their children had died — and even given caskets that they now suspect were empty. In at least three cases before the Spanish courts, caskets have been exhumed and found devoid of remains, according to media reports.

In Torres' case, she was first told her baby died, then informed — allegedly by Valbuena — that her daughter was alive but was being taken away because she was born out of wedlock.

Valbuena, who worked with two Madrid clinics in the 1970s and '80s, was indicted after Torres and Pilar filed a lawsuit claiming she stole and sold Pilar in 1982. According to local media, hundreds of women have claimed Valbuena was involved in the theft of their babies.

Many appeared in court Tuesday, claiming they were still searching for their children, according to Spanish news outlet El Pais.

Valbuena now faces numerous charges, including illegal detention, forgery of public and private documents, threatening behaviour and coercion, the lawyer for Torres told Global Post, adding the nun dealt with about 3,000 adoptions a year between 1967 and 1983.

Torres told Spanish media that Valbuena deserves "the ultimate punishment."

"It has been very, very hard. I have had to relive everything a second time," she told El Pais. "The questions the judge asked me have caused me a lot of pain."

Prior to her testimony, Pilar told El Pais the nun had destroyed the lives of many people.

"If (Valbuena) doesn't pay for it here, I know she will pay for it up above," she said.

For the estimated thousands of victims of the thefts, the Valbuena trial is significant, but "we're just beginning," Antonio Barroso told the Star in a phone interview Tuesday.

Barroso, 43, heads the National Association for Victims of Irregular Adoptions (ANADIR), a group that maintains a DNA database for parents who believe their babies were stolen or people who suspect they were trafficked as infants.

Last October, Barroso told the Star he learned four years earlier he had been bought from a priest and a nun following his birth. DNA tests later confirmed he was not related to his adopted mother, who was named as his biological mother on his birth certificate.

He now devotes himself full-time to running the association, and has filed lawsuits at every level in the Spanish court system.

He said Tuesday there are "many other people implicated" in the trafficking.

"There are nuns, nurses, doctors. They are the robbers," he said.

He added that he knows the nun responsible in his case, but she has not been indicted.

While Barroso is pleased with the Spanish authorities for the charges against Valbuena, "they have to do much more," he said.

Torres and Pilar were reunited last year, after details of hundreds of cases of alleged baby snatching began to emerge. According to The Guardian, both Torres and Pilar had been searching for each other for years.

After Pilar expressed interest in finding her biological mother, Pilar's family found Valbuena, who allegedly told them Torres had been a prostitute.

Torres and Pilar were finally reunited in July after a TV show put the families in contact. Their biological connection was confirmed by DNA test.

Torres told Global Post the pacifier and baby blanket she kept for Pilar had become emblems of hope that she would one day reunite with her daughter.

When she finally did, she gave them to Pilar, and she now keeps them on her bed.