A Welsh couple yesterday explained how they paid £8,200 sterling to an Internet adoption broker for twin girls - only to discover they had already been sold to a couple in California.
After a dash across the US, Mr Alan Kilshaw (45) and his wife, Judith Kilshaw (47), brought the babies to their home in Buckley, north Wales, last December and are now refusing to give them up. But they are facing an FBI investigation and the couple who originally bought the girls for a reported £4,000 have accused them of abduction.
After IVF treatment failed and because they felt they were too old to adopt a child in Britain, the Kilshaws resorted to finding a baby on the Internet. They found the six-month-old twins, originally named Kiara and Keyara, for sale through a web business - Caring Heart Adoption - run by Ms Tina Johnson, from her home in San Diego.
The adoption was arranged and the couple travelled to San Diego to collect the children. However, the Kilshaws claim that when they arrived they were not told that the girls had already been sold to Richard and Vickie Allen. The Kilshaws believe that Ms Johnson tricked the Allens into returning the children by saying that their mother, Ms Tranda Wecker (28), wanted to say a final farewell.
They insist Ms Wecker changed her mind about the Allens and wanted the Kilshaws to have the children who were handed over to them for twice the price paid by the Allens.
The Kilshaws then drove across the United States to Little Rock, Arkansas, where adoption laws are more relaxed and they obtained an interim adoption order. They renamed the twins, Kimberley and Belinda, and they legally arrived in Britain on December 30th.
The girls have visas and can remain in Britain for six months. The Kilshaws will apply for British citizenship on their behalf. They have spent £24,000 to bring the girls to Britain.
At a press conference yesterday Mr Kilshaw insisted the couple had done nothing wrong.
But the British Agencies for Adoption and Fostering criticised them, saying the case demonstrated why private adoption was illegal in Britain. A spokeswoman for the children's charity, Kidscape, told The Irish Times she was concerned that children were being "reduced to a commodity on the Internet and the highest bidder wins."
Mr Jack Straw, the British Home Secretary, said that adopting children via the Internet was "a revolting idea" and added his department was investigating the circumstances of the case.