Adoption Case Strikes Kind Blow for Reform

* Re: “Jury Favors Father in Adoption Case,” Dec. 5.

I’m heartened to see that John Kessel is a birth father wise enough not to seek restitution in the form of battling for custody of his biological son five years after the baby’s placement with adoptive parents, but rather in the form of hefty punitive damages against adoption lawyer David Keene Leavitt, the birth mother and her family who defrauded him of his right to parent his child. Not only has Kessel compassionately spared his son the horrendous emotional traumas that reclaimed children have suffered, he has also perhaps landed a real blow for adoption reform. You see, as long as children are the primary victims in these tragic human struggles, the status quo will likely prevail. Now that some of the grown-ups who machinate in the ever-growing mercenary business of infant adoption have been traumatized where it counts--in the wallet--maybe we’ll see some sorely needed reform.

MARCY WINEMAN AXNESS

Calabasas