Returned 7-year-old Russian adopted boy happy back in Russia

Returned Adopted Boy Celebrates in Russia

A Tennessee woman has stirred international outrage by sending a 7-year-old Russian boy she adopted back to Moscow on a flight by himself.

Artyom Savelyev, whose adoptive name is Justin Hansen, arrived in Moscow unaccompanied on a United Airlines flight Thursday from Washington. He was carrying a letter from his adoptive mother, Torry Hansen, 33, a licensed registered nurse of Shelbyville, Tennessee, saying she was returning him due to severe psychological problems.

Savelyev was adopted in late September 2009, from the town of Partizansk in Russia’s Far East and it was claimed in the letter that she had been given no warning of his violent and psychotic behaviour.

The letter said, “I was lied to and misled by the Russian Orphanage workers and director regarding his mental stability and other issues. …

“After giving my best to this child, I am sorry to say that for the safety of my family, friends, and myself, I no longer wish to parent this child.”

His adopted grandmother Nancy Hansen flew to Washington with the boy, and bought the child a one-way ticket on a United Airlines flight from Washington to Moscow. She then put him on the plane with the note from her daughter.

On the flight, the boy was watched by a United Airlines flight attendant. On arrival he was picked up from the Moscow airport by a driver who was paid $200 by the family to deliver the child to the Russian Education and Science Ministry.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called the actions by the grandmother “the last straw” in a string of U.S. adoptions gone wrong, including three in which Russian children had died in the U.S.

Lavrov said his ministry would recommend that the U.S. and Russia hammer out an agreement before any new adoptions are allowed.

Previous adoption failures include…

In 2006, Peggy Sue Hilt of Manassas, Virginia, was sentenced to 25 years in prison after being convicted of fatally beating a 2-year-old girl adopted from Siberia months earlier.

In 2008, Kimberly Emelyantsev of Tooele, Utah, was sentenced to 15 years after pleading guilty to killing a Russian infant in her care.

In March of this year, a couple were accused of killing their 7-year-old adopted Russian son at their home near the town of Dillsburg, Pennsylvania.

The U.S. ambassador to Russia, John Beyrle, said he was “deeply shocked by the news” and “very angry that any family would act so callously toward a child that they had legally adopted.”

Last year, nearly 1,600 Russian children were adopted in the United States, according to Tatyana Yakovleva of the ruling United Russia party.

Top officials from the U.S. State Department plan to travel to Moscow this week to push Russia to allow adoptions by U.S. families to continue.

AssociatedPress April 16, 2010
Russian and U.S. officials have given birthday gifts to the 8-year-old boy who was returned to Russia by his adoptive American mother. The face of the child was blurred in the video provided to The Associated Press.