Chapter Two

Oleg & Elena In Motion

Oleg and Elena

  When the FedEx package arrived that day in mid-November 2000, the Towells tore it open, placed the video into their VCR and hit “play.” Brian, Alysha, Tiffany and Brody gathered around the set, holding their breath in anticipation. It’s an exciting moment when you view the beloved child’s videotape for the first time.

    All were surprised because the first child on the video wasn’t Oleg, but a teeny, tiny little girl with a shaved head! A teeny, tiny little girl who strongly resembled the Gerber Baby. 

    What was this!  Who was this little girl sitting on the floor, barely out of babyhood, looking up, awestruck at the camera? 

   From somewhere in the room where she was the Towells heard a Russian voice telling the little girl to crawl, but she was more interested in the attention that was suddenly being lavished upon her and the odd looking video camera. 

    Finally, as soon as the off-camera voice got her to crawl, the tape cut out and the scene shifted to the tiny shaven-haired baby girl eating what appeared to be runny porridge and then attempting to chew on a bit of bread. That baby girl was striking, but what was she doing on Oleg’s tape?

    Then the video cut to Oleg for his video debut.  Alysha described Oleg to me:

Oleg was shown sitting playing with stacking blocks.  He had eyes that told a sad story.  He looked curiously intelligent, though you could tell he was delayed.  The worker in the video (who we would later learn was the orphanage director) encouraged Oleg to crawl.  He got up on all fours and it was a pitiful sight.  His right leg was turned his body.  His right foot turned in front of his left knee.  Both legs were bowed out the knee down.  After he crawled, he was stripped down and he was covered in bites.  And his buttocks bore a third-degree burn.  He also had an egg on the center of his forehead bigger than a fifty-cent piece.  His medical said it was a hemotoma, but it turned out he had just cracked his head on his crib by trying to stand up.  But we didn’t learn that until later.  Oleg didn’t speak at all on this video.  He followed instructions through 3 activities with the orphanage director. He also pulled up to a standing position so you could tell he couldn’t support himself. 

    They were so smitten with those little children! Judging from Oleg’s paperwork, it stated that he was in an orphanage in Blagoveshchensk, in the Amur region of Russia along the eponymous river which divides Russia and China. 

    They reviewed Oleg’s scant, two-page medical report. He was nearly two and a half years old, born in June 1998; the video was been shot in September 2000.

   It stated that his biological mother’s rights had been terminated in May 2000. He had two older brothers and a younger sister — Elena. His medical noted the usual measurements, dates of immunizations and tests for HIV and syphilis. He had usual perinatal encephelopathy that all the Russian medicals state. He was listed as having “psychological/speech developmental delay” and “rickets.”

    The hematoma that the Towells saw on his head was listed as well. It could have been a birth defect, a bruise, a severe head injury, a blood disease — anything. For obvious reasons, they were concerned.

    Noted on page two: “Child did not have spinal trauma.  He had hot water burn after mother tried to give him a bath in hot water. Neurologist and orthopedist both agreed that he doesn’t have any neurological problems except for severe case of rickets. Now he can pull himself up in the chair. Dr. Downing saw the child and feels he may have rickets and cerebral palsy.”

    The same Dr. Downing who told Linda Wright what a great, caring place Perm’s Dom Rebonyka #2 was. But who had dispatched Dr. Downing to see Oleg and why was it mentioned on his medical report?

    What the Towells didn’t know was Oleg’s video and medical had been sent to at least seven other American families for review.  Each of the seven families had rejected his referral.  Had these families rejected Oleg because of Dr. Downing or what their “international medical specialists” had told them?

    After watching the video, Alysha got on the telephone and called BBAS to have her second conversation with Denise Hubbard. The first thing she asked was “Who is the little girl on Oleg’s tape?”

    Denise had a surprise for Alysha! Amazingly, “the reps” had filmed the little girl and she had failed to tell the Towells that she was Oleg’s sister who was also available for adoption! Her name was Elena, the name of Oleg’s younger sister that appeared on his medical report.

   When the video had been shot, she hadn’t even been a year old. She would be one in December.

    Denise sent them Elena’s medical report the next day with apologies for not having done so earlier. 

    They were thrilled.  How wonderful!  Oleg had a darling baby sister! Even though they weren’t planning on adopting two children, a sibling pair would do just fine.

    With a younger female child added into the mix, Alysha and Denise discussed the new financial situation for adopting Oleg and Elena. Denise said she would ask “the reps” if Oleg could be adopted as “special needs.” During this conversation, she led Alysha to believe that the Russians fixed the adoption costs, not BBAS. 

    Alysha, as the months dragged on, learned there were many channels through which adoption costs were set, more so in the United States than in Russia. It would be the last time “special needs fees” would be discussed regarding Oleg because Denise was pulling a fast one on the Towells.

    And this is how she did it. 

    Baby girls are highly coveted by Americans. PAPs in the United States want to adopt more girls than boys.  Elena was a very young, blue-eyed girl.

   Amrex and BBAS were going to get their money’s worth from Elena and in order to do that, they would charge the Towells as if she were the child they had first considered, instead of her brother.

    BBAS’s fee for adopting a sibling of a child who was under four years old was “just $3,500.” Instead of granting Oleg “special needs” status and adding Elena on for $3,500 (a “real deal!” Denise joyously told Alysha), BBAS/Amrex came back and charged the full amount for the healthy, female Elena. 

   If they had only given Oleg special needs status and tacked on the $3,500 for Elena, it would have saved the Towells thousands of dollars.

    BBAS main concerned wasn't with saving its clients money, but rather with making it for themselves. If they had charged special-needs fees for Oleg and added on $3,500 for Elena, there would have been no profit for Denise and Amrex.  

     The blame for this is in the "Letter of Agreement" agencies sign when they become an "Amrex, Inc." agency.  Denise had her hands tied on these fees; if she had granted Oleg as "special needs" and tagged on Elena as the sibling, she would have been in breach of the contract she most likely signed with them in December 1999.

     I refer to this paragraph in the Exhibt A, Amrex Fee Schedule included with Amrex's "Letter of Agreement":

ADOPTION OF A SIBLING GROUP

Processing Fees for the adoption of a sibling group is based on the processing fee for adoption of the            younger category in the group, plus $1,500 for the processing of adoption of each additional child in the group regardless of the category.

    Elena was that "younger category" and cemented the deal: for good and bad they would adopt both children. By Nov 30 the contract was signed and sent in with a check for $3,000 for both Oleg and Elena’s identification fees. They prepaid the $6,175 and $3,500 for both children. Both checks were payable to Building Blocks Adoption Service, Inc. 

    Per the contract drafted by Denise Hubbard and her “corporate attorney” Richard J. Marco, Jr in January 2000 the fees specified in BBAS contract were non-refundable.

    Their last fees would be paid in January after their dossier was turned in. When they traveled, they would have to bring $6,000 in cash to Russia.

    They truly believed that they would become Oleg and Elena’s legal parents and the contract was a fair one. From there on in, there was no turning back: the Towells, for good and very worst, were emotional and financial hostages to Building Blocks Adoption Service, Inc. and to Denise L. Hubbards lies, stories and concoctions.

    Elena’s two page medical report was received two days later. It differed slightly from Oleg’s. She had been born in December 1999 and placed in the orphanage in August 2000 at 8 months of age, three months after Oleg. The biological mother’s rights were also terminated. 

    Included in Elena’s medical were the same measurements, tests and immunizations that appeared on Oleg’s medical. Aside from having “perinatal encephelopathy — recovery,” she was listed as also having rickets plus “mild anemia” at birth and was listed as having a “psychological delay.”

    These medical reports are sparse; there is not much information about the children’s health or well being to be found in them. They are vague and unhelpful to a professional attempting to review them. They were far less specific than either Cyril’s or Yekaterina’s medicals from Perm.

    But to the Towells’, the children on the screen became theirs in their hearts; Tiffany and Brody were immediately excited. They were going to have a new brother and sister joining them soon!

    Alysha said: “We sat awestruck at our two new children. We still wonder how people turn down referrals. How could we not want these wonderful children who needed to be loved so badly? Money or no money, we were determined to bring these two angels home.”

    Unbeknownst to the Towells, the Amur region had become Amrex’s chief safe, quick one-trip region. Their program in Yekaterinburg was being trashed by an allegedly disreputable facilitator.

   At least two American families, after traveling to Yekaterinburg lost their referrals in November 2000 and returned home without their children. This facilitator's actions would be the reason Amrex and one of two of its accredited agencies — Adoption Alliance — would sever their working relationship. Without Adoption Alliance, Amrex was left with only Beacon House as its sole accredited agency.

    The majority of children placed with BBAS families in 2000-2002 had been either from Blagoveshchensk/Amur and Vladivostok. With one or two from Kurgan tossed into the mix.

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