A Hugs Connection

Review: We are writing this complaint due to the horrific experience we have had with the Connections Adoption Agency. Which has only gotten worse due to the fact that they and their lawyers have stopped all communications with us in our efforts to reach a settlement. Much like the other complaint, we read about Connections we also feel our journey was filled with misrepresentations, dishonesty, and total incompetence. Our unfortunate experience with this agency was ultimately a nightmare. As a social worker and teacher we weren’t naive to the challenges adoption can present, but unfortunately, we had no idea we would lose a baby as well as tens of thousands of dollars, all because of total incompetence and negligence on the part of Connections. To add insult to injury the total disrespect we experienced during our journey was unlike anything we have ever experienced. The executive director [redacted] and hired caseworker [redacted] were not honest with us from the very start of our painful experience with this agency. We were provided misleading quotes of financial fees and mistreated on numerous levels. Similar to another complaint regarding Connections, we experienced multiple issues. This complaint we will focus on the most damaging.

First, the contract we signed states the agency has due diligence to locate the birthfather. Before we sent a dime for this match, we were told that both the birthmother and birthfather were in prison and would be incarcerated throughout the pregnancy. Within a few weeks of sending them money, the story began to change, we were told the birthmother turned “state evidence” and was released, but that her focus was to get her other children back from the state, and she still wanted to go forward with the adoption. Again we were assured that the birthfather was incarcerated for the rest of his life and it was a “nonissue” and he didn’t have any rights. As things progressed, and time went on, we were given different information on a weekly basis and the stories they told were filled with inconsistencies.

As time went on, we were told to be on “high alert”, and to be ready to leave at a moments notice for weeks. Ultimately, three weeks before the birthmother’s due date, we were told there was a “potential birthfather issue”. After providing Connections with $6,000 for legal fees, connections refused to provide us with his contact information for the lawyer they had arranged for in Kentucky. On that Friday afternoon, we googled the attorney for his phone number and contacted him directly when he said “are you ready for a fight?”. It was never our intention, we would never want to “fight” for a baby that was wanted by either one of her birthparents. We wanted a situation in which the birthparents wanted to place their baby with an adoptive couple. During this time in our conversations with Connections, [redacted] encouraged us to drive from Maine to Kentucky to where the birthmother was having the baby, get the baby and leave out a back parking lot and immediately leave town and check into a hotel under a different name. We ultimately hired our own attorney here in Maine to represent us, and she advised us this was too high risk for our own legal and safety concerns.

Given this all occurred on a Friday afternoon and evening and feeling in crisis, we contacted the on-call worker, who was very was sympathetic, however, informed us the Connections director [redacted] refused to be in touch with us to help guide us through this stressful situation. To add insult to injury the following Monday, we received an email from the Connections executive director to all her clients stating: “I am trying to find in the nicest way to let you know that I have heard a sense of entitlement to my off hours over the past year, I work very hard all week long for all of you. My job is not a 9 to 5.” At the end of the day, we discovered that the birthmother had been lying about about many things, which included, the lie that the birthfather was in prison.

This horrific situation could have been avoided from the very beginning if only Connections simply did due diligence to find the birthfather, instead of taking the birthmother’s word. All they had to do is make one phone call to the department of corrections in Louisville to find out the birthfather was not in prison.

Our trust has been broken with Connections, and we have terminated our contract with them. However they failed to return money that we are owed, and have refused to give us a copy of our file. We have hired an attorney who has tried to resolve our issues, but Connections and their attorney have stopped all communication with us. As we stated earlier, there is many more horrific details to this story, but wanted to address our biggest issue. We are happy to answer any questions or concerns about our devastating experience, please don’t hesitate to get in contact with us.

Thank you

[redacted] and [redacted]

([redacted]