Authorities uncover illegal adoption ring

ZAPOPAN (AP):

Life seemed to give Karla Zepeda a break when a woman came to her dusty neighbourhood of cinder-block homes and dirt roads looking for babies to photograph in an anti-abortion ad campaign.

The woman asked to use the 15-year-old's baby girl in a two-week photo shoot for $755 ($10,000 pesos), a small fortune for a teen mother who earns $180 a month at a sandwich stand and shares a cramped, one-storey house with her disabled mother, stepfather, and three brothers.

But nine month-old Camila wasn't just posing for photographs when she was taken away.

Jalisco state investigators say the child was left for weeks at a time in the care of an Irish couple who had come to Ajijic, a town of cobblestone streets and gated communities 37 miles (60 kilometres) away, thinking they were adopting her.

Illegal adoption ring

Prosecutors say the baby was apparently part of an illegal adoption ring that ensnared destitute young Mexican women trying to earn more for their children and childless Irish couples desperate to become parents.

Camila and nine other children have been turned over to state officials who suspect they were being groomed for illegal adoptions. And authorities hint that far more children could be involved: Lead investigator Blanca Barron told reporters the ring may have been operating for 20 years, though she gave no details. Prosecutors also say four of the children show signs of sexual abuse, though they gave no details on how or by whom.

Nine people have been detained, including two suspected leaders of the ring, but no one has yet been charged.