https://www.thedailybeast.com/ex-arizona-official-paul-petersen-gets-six-years-for-smuggling-pregnant-women-into-us-to-sell-their-babies?ref=home

What a rotten sleaze ball.

One tiny point...

It wasn't "smuggling" as we normally think of smuggling. The women just flew here from the Marshall Islands, provided their IDs and then walked out of the airport. No other documentation required.

Yes, they'd have to lie if asked if they were intending to give away their babies, but everyone lies...

I think it was smuggling because it's unlawful to have someone come to the US from the Marshall Islands for the purposes of giving birth and adopting the baby. And then their passports were taken from them, so they were held against their will.

Edit to add:
smug·gle
/ˈsməɡəl/

verb
move (goods) illegally into or out of a country.
"he's been smuggling cigarettes from Gibraltar into Spain"
convey (someone or something) somewhere secretly and illicitly.
"he smuggled out a message"



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/02/2020 06:54PM by Devoted Exmo.

Perhaps "trafficking" is a more appropriate description.

That's definitely appropriate, since the definition is to deal or trade in something illegal.

I any case. This guy is going down and losing it all.

Update for those interested:

Petersen to begin serving prison sentence on 1/21

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0UOBuIdM5M

"Since 1986, the Republic of the Marshall Islands has enjoyed a special relationship with the United States — one that allows its residents to live, work and study in the United States without visas. Marshallese are not considered immigrants or refugees, nor are they considered U.S. citizens."


I can't speak to how the ladies were kept here once they got here, but getting here just took a plane ticket.

I guess things changed later: "Per a 2003 agreement with the Republic of the Marshall Islands, Marshallese citizens may enter the U.S. for employment but are prohibited from coming to America for the purpose of adoption."

Right! So when the immensely pregnant Marshallese woman got off the plane and went thru customs, the agent would ask, "are you here to give birth and sell your baby?"

And the Marshallese woman would say, "nope" and waddle on through the airport.

That 2003 agreement was put into place because of all the Marshellese women selling their babies, and their easy entry into the US was due to the guilt the USA felt for ruining all their atolls.

The odds are that the baby selling is still going on.

I'm guessing they have to prove they're here for employment. So it might be more than just saying it's not for adoption.

My understanding is that citizens of the country known as The Marshall Islands have free and unfettered access to the United States.

Again, this special relationship exists due to the guilt the USA apparently felt for making so much of their land radioactive.

"There is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated — And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated."

And this law is called the Law of Demand & Supply ...

I don't think anyone has anything against the notion of adoption; where adults take upon themselves the obligations of 'parenthood' (the definition of which is probably still way up in the air...)

Where things get 'tender' is the supply chain that provides adopters with adoptees. But pretty much everyone is on board with the adoptees looking forward to a 'better' life.

The Marshall Islands production, originally starring Bob Hope & Bing Crosby, titled On the Road to Marshall Islands Adoption, began playing around 1983, when the USA created a special relationship with that country. The demand on the supply side of the adoption market made sure that the special relationship was quickly identified as being very advantageous! There are more infertile married couples that there are available babies.

The LM who asked me to marry her less than a month after I got home, and who later 'discovered' she was Gay, later adopted a baby boy in Guatemala and smuggled his cute little butt into the United States. (Weird to think he could be grandpa by now!) I used the word 'smuggled' because it fit. While there may have been a legal method for attaining that same result, it was a great deal easier, as long as it worked, to go the smuggling route.

With the market demand, it's no wonder that 'do-gooders' in the Marshall Islands asked the USA for help in stemming the booming "get pregnant in the Marshall Island, sell your baby in the United States" racket. The USA agreed and posted a "Marshallese women: Do Not Sell Your Babies in the USA!"

I haven't looked, but I don't think any of the Marshallese women who sold their babies have been arrested. Maybe there's a 'Watch List' of women who came here pregnant and went home not pregnant and without a baby, so that if they show up again, a flag pops up, "make sure she's not pregnant!" What else can the USA do?

Even today, when a Marshallese woman, in a very gravid state, deplanes at LAX, a Customs Enforcement Agent may ask her, "Are you here to sell your baby?" What do you think happens if she says, "Oh, my, no!" There is no CEA-special ops squad that surveils here 24/7.

What the defendant did was, probably because of inordinate greed coupled with hubris, was momentarily disrupt a smooth, steady flow of cute little babies from the Marshall Islands to affluent American couples.

I'd bet up to $5, cash!, that this market place continues to flourish. I think it measures up as being a more 'wholesome' baby market than the one run by LDSFS back in the day.

elderolddog Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Right! So when the immensely pregnant Marshallese
> woman got off the plane and went thru customs, the
> agent would ask, "are you here to give birth and
> sell your baby?"
>
> And the Marshallese woman would say, "nope" and
> waddle on through the airport.
>
> That 2003 agreement was put into place because of
> all the Marshellese women selling their babies,
> and their easy entry into the US was due to the
> guilt the USA felt for ruining all their atolls.
>
> The odds are that the baby selling is still going
> on.

There are also under 50,000 Marshallese so they can never swamp the USA like certain other Third World groupings.

I think it would actually be the babies that were smuggled? In any case, the whole thing is base and dirty.

PS - What is the tie to Arkansas? Why did he keep them there? He had houses in CA, UT and AZ. All I can think is that the adoption laws there are lax? Pretty damn slick he got the state to pay all the medical expenses.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/2020 12:47AM by Susan I/S.

I wonder if he had a temple recommend recently and if so, if it has been revoked. The mormon church will do just about anything to take a baby away from a single woman and give the baby to a married couple. This guy was helping to facilitate that, even though the church wasn't involved.

MY HS ex and her hubby basically stole 3 kids this way. They ran to the temple to be sealed that way morally the kids were "theirs", when these investigations begun, they got passports and were ready to leave the country.

Was Evan Mecham in on the scam ?

Evan Mecham died in 2998\.

Or 2008.

Thank you for clarifying that. For a moment I felt as if I were engaged in a discussion with our esteemed scholar of Taoist Confusionism.

Well!? Which is it!!

Don't leave me hanging...

Small keyboard on my phone.
God wouldn't curse Arizona with Mecham for a millenium.

Did Paul Petersen get excommunicated for his crimes? My aunt got excommunicated at age 19 for getting pregnant out of wedlock at BYU Provo.

That's sick. I hope your aunt and your cousin/s went on to have a wonderful life free of people who mistreat them.

My aunt got re baptized. Got married outside the temple and got sealed in the temple a few years later. Now my aunt and her husband are very active in the church.

subeamnotlogedin Wrote:
------------------------
> Did Paul Petersen get
> excommunicated for his
> crimes?  My aunt got
> excommunicated at age
> 19 for getting pregnant
> out of wedlock at BYU.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Petersen_(criminal)

It doesn't address the excommunication issue...  But note that his wife divorced his sorry butt.  Did she give back any jewelry or finary he bought her with the ill-gotten gains?

I wonder what happens if an EQP pleads guilty to DUI?

Sometimes, the variability in the running of the mormon church amazes me!  It's almost like flipping for quarters or playing roulette!

It's not a lot different from early Mormonism when they took Indian children and put them in Mormon homes. Then they had the nerve to claim the children were becoming "whiter." Not a good past and not a good present.

At least 70 babies.

https://kslnewsradio.com/1962469/paul-petersen-ex-politician-in-prison-for-adoption-scheme-loses-appeal/