Peggy Sue Hilt has been charged with manslaughter in the death of her adopted Russian daughter. Hilt’s court hearing is scheduled for August
MOSCOW, July 19 (RIA Novosti) - The Russian Prosecutor General’s Office intends to press criminal charges against intermediaries profiting from adoption, according to Deputy Prosecutor General Sergei Fridinsky.
Numerous law infractions have been discovered involving the adoption of Russian children after the prosecutor general’s investigation. According to Fridinsky, since the early nineties, the number of children adopted by Russians fell from 14,000 to 7,000 per year, while the number adopted by foreign nationals rose nearly seven times, from 1,400 to 9,000.
In the last five years in Russia, more than 1000 children have been killed, of which only one was killed by an adoptive parent.
“From 2000 to 2005, 1,080 murders of children were committed in Russia, and 21 attempted murders.”
While confirming that these statistics are official, Fridinsky refuted claims that between 1000 and 2000 children are being killed in Russia each year.
The Prosecutor General’s Office has found instances of bribes for adoption, which is forbidden by law, as well as infringements of the Labor Code, in which agency workers were not officially registered in their place of work.
On May 4, U.S. citizen Irma Pavlis was found guilty of manslaughter of a child, adopted in Russia, and sentenced to 12 years in prison. After this, the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office announced numerous law infringements by foreign citizens involving adoption.
At the beginning of July, another murder of a child adopted from Russia in the U.S. was discovered. Peggy Sue Hilt, a 22-year-old North Carolina resident, was charged with manslaughter after being arrested for beating to death her two-and-a-half-year old adopted Russian daughter. Her court hearing is scheduled for August.
