‘Return to Sender,’ Adopted Boy’s One-way Ticket to Moscow

Russia furious over adopted boy sent back from US

MOSCOW – Russia threatened to suspend all child adoptions by U.S. families Friday after a 7-year-old boy adopted by a woman from Tennessee was sent alone on a one-way flight back to Moscow with a note saying he was violent and had severe psychological problems. [a written letter]

The boy, Artyom Savelyev, was put on a plane by his adopted grandmother, Nancy Hansen of Shelbyville.

8-Year-old adopted Russian boy Artyom Savelyev gets into a minivan
outside a police department office in Moscow (Rossia 1 TV)

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.

The cases have prompted outrage in Russia, where foreign adoption failures are reported prominently. Russian main TV networks ran extensive reports on the latest incident in their main evening news shows.

VIDEO: Unwanted adopted boy arrives in Russia

The Russian education ministry immediately suspended the license of the group involved in the adoption — the World Association for Children and Parents, a Renton, Washington-based agency — for the duration of an investigation. In Tennessee, authorities were investigating the adoptive mother, Torry Hansen, 33.

Any possible freeze could affect hundreds of American families. Last year, nearly 1,600 Russian children were adopted in the United States.

“We’re obviously very troubled by it,” U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said in Washington when asked about the boy’s case. He told reporters the U.S. and Russia share a responsibility for the child’s safety and Washington will work closely with Moscow to make sure adoptions are legal and appropriately monitored.

Asked if he thought a suspension by Russia was warranted, Crowley said, “If Russia does suspend cooperation on the adoption, that is its right. These are Russian citizens.”

A children’s home in the city of Partizansk, the Primorsky Territory (Far East Russia)

“It is monstrous, immoral and illegal” – Medvedev

“It is a monstrous deed on the part of his adoptive parents, to take the child and virtually throw him onto an airplane heading in the opposite direction. To say, `I’m sorry I could not cope with it, take everything back’ is not only immoral but also against the law,” Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said in an interview with ABC News.

“We should understand what is going on with our children or we will totally refrain from the practice of adopting Russian children by American adoptive parents. I can only say we are alarmed by the tendency.”