Up Coming Events

Editor's Message

Barring any imminent danger to the child and because both parties knew that the arrangement was temporary, this should be a clear case where the natural parents should gain custody of the child.

What I find offensive with this case is the Baker's stance that Anna Mae He would be treated poorly if she were to return to China with her parents because she is female. The implication is culturally bigoted. Although my knowledge of China and Chinese culture and life is limited, I find the Baker's position to be a stereotype of a whole country of over a billion people. Just as you will find both the stereotypical short person and people of Yao Ming's size (7'5") in China, I am sure that China is not a completely misogynistic society as portrayed in the Western media.

How can China be painted with such a broad condemning brush by anyone here when considering the fact that women were treated as property for a large portion of our American history? While other countries around the world have had women heads of state, the odds of electing a woman president in this country still seems a very remote possibility. Even Pakistan has had a woman leader. And what about our Congress? A handful of women senators out of one hundred? It's not even close to representative of our population where women outnumber the men.

If custody rights were based on who had superior culture, what is the measuring stick by which we use to say which is better? If custody rights were based on how wealthy the parents are, wouldn't all poor families be in trouble of losing their children?

Some Americans seem to presume our way of life is so far superior to others that it trumps the basic logic that a child should be raised by their natural parents. Using the Baker's arguments one could argue that every African American child in the US should be raised by white parents simply based on the statistically greater possibility that African Americans are more likely to live in poverty or be in jail than whites. Imagine the same arguments being used to say that Asians should raise white children. Aren't these positions just as much utter nonsense no matter what race or group uses them?

Employees at the agency, the court employees, and a Chinese language translator testified later that no one explained the complex nature of the agreement to the He's. The couple also weren't advised to hire a lawyer. According to the Baker's, there was a separate verbal agreement at that time to grant them permanent custody, a contention that the He's absolutely deny. As Mrs. He said, "Why would we visit our daughter every week if we wanted to give her away?"

Soon after Anna Mae's first birthday the He's formally asked for the return of their baby. Under Tennessee law, returning the child to the He's required the consent of both a judge and the Bakers. Although both parents were now working in Chinese restaurants, their request was turned down by a court on the ground that they were financially unstable and the then pending sexual assault case.

Tensions increased to the point where the Baker's refused to allow Anna Mae to leave the house with her parents on her second birthday to take a family portrait. The Baker's called the police, who warned the He's to stay away from the Baker home. Fearful of more trouble with the law, the He's ended their weekly visits with Anna Mae. Under Tennessee law, failure to visit children for four months constitutes abandonment, an ingredient in terminating parental rights.

Lawyers for the He's argue that the Baker's intended to keep Anna Mae all along. They point to a journal kept by Mrs. Baker titled, "Visits from Jack and Casey." Mrs. Baker documented mounting distress over the bonding of mother and child and frustration as the birth parents demanded more time with their daughter. "We would like to get visits to every other week," she wrote when Anna Mae was 8 months old. "We feel like they would wean away, but the last two visits we could see Casey is wanting to come more."

In their case to terminate the Hes' parental rights, the Bakers depict Mr. He as untrustworthy and his wife as prone to hysterics. Mrs. He once picketed the Bakers' home, and on another occasion, they say, tried to take Anna Mae away during a chance encounter at Wal-Mart. "To me, if Casey truly loved her daughter, she would leave her with us," Mrs. Baker said. She added that a life in China, where female babies are sometimes deemed inferior to males, would be a hardship. The Bakers also argue that the He's failed to provide child support or to visit Anna Mae and that being separated from their own four children would be too traumatic. They have also said that the He's are deliberately prolonging the legal process to forestall deportation back to China.

The He's argue that their daughter was "kidnapped by white Christians" using their wealth and the courts to their own advantage. They also point to the two children born to them subsequently and the fact that no complaints have been raised about their parenting skills by anyone.

The He's haven't seen Anna Mae since 2002 when the Baker's obtained a court order preventing them from doing so. Mr. He says "If we do not have a reunification, I'm afraid our daughter will grow up thinking we abandoned her," he said. "I think that is worse than anything else."

Final arguments in the case are due on March 22nd. The Chinese community and the Chinese Embassy in Washington DC are closely following this case.