Chapter 6:
Aloha to Lee
For reasons unknown, Lee Slater refused to give either a refund or Janet’s dossier back. Towards the end of August, Slater began openly communicating with Janet in email and by telephone.
Slater told Janet not to say anything to Denise Hubbard about their communication. Janet played along, but felt some game was being played by all three women. Janet felt more like the pawn in a power struggle. A pawn whose money was funding the entire debacle. She felt like a minor character in Denise Hubbard’s game of adoption deception.
While communicating directly with Slater, Janet also continued to work with her attorney. He advised her she could try to adopt domestically. Since he was the founder of a domestic adoption agency in Janet’s state, he was able to handle private adoptions. The international adoption course does not run smoothly for everybody, contrary to popular belief.
Slater produced two referrals of children who did not match either Janet’s age or sex requirements during the final two months of their dealings. Both children were said to be from the Republic of Georgia. How and from whom Slater received these referrals is unknown. It’s anybody’s guess. Her Georgian coordinator could have been visiting orphanages, taking photos of children, forging medical reports and sending them on to Slater as available.
The boy’s referral was emailed to Janet, Denise and Kelly in September. Prior, Denise emailed Janet saying there was a “possible referral” of a boy. Would she be interested? Janet responded to Denise stating yes, she was interested in the boy when his “possible referral” became a “true referral.” She said to Denise: “Once this referral becomes real, please let me know as I am very much interested in a true and official referral.”
Subj: Re: possible referral
Date: 9/6/2004 11:10:48 Eastern Standard Time
From: lee@adoptwithlee.org
To: Janet Ostrander, denise@bbadoption.org, kcarter@bbas.org
Aloha Janet:
This little boy has been taken out of foster care (the family gave him much attention – my coordinator
said he looked very happy when she saw him this summer) and put into an orphanage so that he will be
available when they pass the legislation.
This new legislation passes and your paperwork is processed the timing could possible coincide and the
waiting time will be quite short until you are able to travel.
At this time you do not have to make up your mind. We are only trying to find a family that would be
interested in the possibility of adopting this little one.
I am sending you a picture of him in another e-mail.
With aloha,
Lee
Slater didn’t send Janet the photo of the boy after the email. Janet asked Denise the next day where the photo of the boy was. Denise responded:
Subj: Lee
Date: 9/7/2004 10:25:07 Eastern Standard Time
From: denise@bbadoption.org
To: Janet Ostrander
Janet:
Lee did not send a photo of the boy. Note that this is something she is trying to do with this little boy.
She cannot guarantee placement or referral until the legislation passes.
Best Regards,
Denise Hubbard
Executive Director
Which all begs the question: why was Lee Slater mentioning this little boy at all if she couldn’t guarantee his placement? Why was Denise Hubbard allowing Slater to pass this information along when the country was at a near standstill? Wasn’t he protected by any laws in the Republic of Georgia prohibiting him being used in such a way? Obviously, Lee Slater had been taught in the ways of referral deception by her felon friend Lauryn Galindo.
It was Lee Slater who sent Janet the boy’s photo the next day. Janet does not feel Denise was aware Slater had sent her the picture.
Janet’s heart went out to the child, so small and needy in the accompanying photograph. He really needed a mom. The problem was, he did not fit into her approved homestudy’s parameters. He was a possible referral from a country which was theoretically open, but as a practical matter, unlikely to happen.
Janet took it, finally, upon herself to email Robin Busse who had worked at the American Embassy in Tbilisi. She had been given Busse’s email address and name from Lee Slater.
From: Janet Ostrander
Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 8:45 AM
Subject: 1600A urgent info needed
Hi. This is being written to verify where my INS approval is. It is supposed to be in Tbilsi, Georgia.
Could you please email as soon as possible. Thank you so much in advance for your time.
Again, Janet’s confusion is apparent. She was still thinking Georgia was in Russia.
Robin Busse responded days later on September 13, 2004:
Subj: RE: 1600A urgent info needed
Date: 9/13/2004 7:33:50 AM Eastern Standard Time
From: BusseRA@state.gov
To: Janet Ostrander
Dear Ms. Ostrander:
I am no longer working at the American Embassy Tbilisi and have forwarded your e-mail to our ACS
Assistant Ms. Maia Abralava and our Consular Associate Ms. Ana Nava-Liess who will check whether
the Embassy Tbilisi received your 1-600A approval known to you as the 1-171H and to BCIS (former
INS) as the Visas 37 cable.
Sincerely,
Robin Busse
Consul
American Embassy Brasilia, Brazil
Well, no, her 171H was in Moscow, not Tbilisi. Nobody had told her to change it from Moscow to Tbilisi.
The second possible and to Janet’s mind, unofficial referral came directly from Lee Slater. She was a sick little girl. Slater sent it to her on September 29:
Subj: Young Girl Available Now
Date: 9/29/2004 3:43:42 AM Eastern Standard Time
From: lee@adoptwithlee.org
To: Janet Ostrander
Aloha Janet. Our rep is about to process paperwork on a young girl. She is also looking for a family for this
little one. We think the processing and travel time on these girls will be very quick.
First Name: XXXX
Last Name: XXXX
DOB: 09.17.2000
W. for now: 13.500 kg
L -92 cm
Head -47 cm
Chest – 51 cm
Active, communicative, knows short poems, loves to sing, has favorite toys, loves to listen when teachers tell stories.
The reason she cannot be processed now is that she is considered special needs. She has a slight case of Cerebral
Palsy in one of her arms and leg. She can play ball and is very active and has a pleasing personality. I think you can
tell from the picture. Let me know if you have an interest. I think I can get a video showing her in motion.
With aloha,
Lee
The accompanying photo shows a sickly little girl, standing weakly.
What right did Lee Slater have referring children from a country that was barely processing adoptions? Didn’t it bother her he was non-placeble and from a nearly closed country? By whose permission was she passing along the boy’s information? Was the Rep she referred to breaking Georgian laws by forwarding this information on to Slater?
All Lee Slater and her facilitator thought about was the nice, hefty check Janet would send them if she accepted the child’s referral. We believe Janet’s money was always at the fore of these shenanigans.
Janet immediately ruled this referral out. Being a single woman, she could not handle a special needs child. This child was more than correctable special needs. She had a debilitating disease.
Both referrals were declined. By this point, Janet was sick of being led on a wild goose chase.
Throughout October Janet went back and forth with Lee Slater. The email exchanges are even more telling about the woman Janet was then dealing with. We understood why Denise had signed on to work with her. Slater and Hubbard are two peas sharing the same pod.
On Oct. 5, Janet sent the following:
Lee I waited patiently for BBA to provide an official referral........never did I get an official referral in all
the time I waited......They kept me in "programs" that were never opened. much money, time and
emotions have been spent in waiting for something that they failed to provide for me. And, now......
they won't even refund the monies spent...that's a shame. .
Slater, circumventing Hubbard, now chased Janet’s money for herself:
From: Lee Slater
To: Janet Ostrander
Sent: Wednesday, October 06, 2004 12:56 AM
Subject: Re: ?
Janet, I am truly sorry about your experience with BBA. Your present position at this time is that
your paperwork is in Georgia and if for instance you wanted the referral of the little girl I sent to you,
we could start processing your paperwork immediately.
She ignored Janet’s request and kept pushing Georgian adoption when she knew full well Georgian adoptions weren’t going to flow in the near future. How could the little girl’s adoption be processed if she couldn’t even leave the country? How hard up was this woman for non-refundable fees?
Janet then did something she had never done before. She contacted another Ohio adoption agency on the advice of her friends. They were very concerned and felt by speaking with their agency, Janet would be guided into clearer waters. What was happening was not normal. When Janet spoke to the Ohio agency, the person she spoke to mentioned Kelsey Hyre’s story as being associated with Building Blocks. She told Janet she could not remember the girl’s name, but it was out there, on the Internet.
Intrigued, Janet hung up and did a Yahoo! Search on Building Blocks and a severed spine. She hit upon our website and found Kelsey Hyre’s story. And our story. And everybody else’s story.
Stunned, Janet sat reading well into the night feeling sicker and sicker as she read. The next day, she emailed us and told us her story.
She then wondered had Lee Slater known about our informational site? How could she have not? Janet, not so naïve anymore, sent Slater the link. Didn’t she know what classless clowns she was dealing with in Medina? Didn’t she care how PAPs were treated and their money stolen?
Slater’s response is the usual:
From: Lee Slater
To: Janet Ostrander
Sent: Tuesday, October 05, 2004 6:39 PM
Subject: Re: ?
Yes, I did get the information. Many things are written that truly have no basis in fact. I have worked
for and now just volunteer for the non-profit that opened the original program in Cambodia over 14 years
ago. Aside from adoptions we established many humanitarian programs, medical, dental, environmental
and literacy which I am proud to say still exist and we continue to support. My husband and have sponsored
since the program closed down 3 years ago a young girl, really a young lady who now dreams of going to
college. And I am also the proud grandmother of a little Cambodian princess. Much of what is written is
recycled misinformation. It is shameful how such can cause reputations and good works to be destroyed
by persons who really have no knowledge but misplaced anger.
It is true she and Daniel Sussot, the founder of World Family, were involved in “humanitarian programs” in Cambodia. So what? It does not exonerate her for her continuing relationship with Lauryn Galindo. Or with Galindo’s Cambodian facilitators who were paying birth mothers off for their babies. That is a fact. One wonders if her Cambodian Princess granddaughter was also bought from a desperate birthmother. If she had been, did Lee Slater lose sleep over it? All signs point to no.
What did our website have to do with Lee Slater purposefully misleading Janet on the Republic of Georgia and its adoption laws. Or giving her false referrals of children who may or may not have existed? That’s definitely lost in translation.
Slater’s response to Janet is ridiculous. What we would expect from an “adoption provider” two steps lower than Denise Hubbard.
Janet next sent Slater a copy of the email Denise had sent for a refund and her dossier back. She emailed it on Oct. 7.
Dear Lee.......did you ever receive this letter from denise at Building Blocks? It was not cc to you. It was
just an email sent from Denise to me. Would you please respond to this email asap.
Kindly,
Janet Ostrander
Lee Slater’s response:
From: Lee Slater
To: Janet Ostrander
Sent: Thursday, October 07, 2004 6:39PM
Subject: Re: Confidential
Yes, Janet I did get that e-mail. I believe we spoke shortly after and we discussed the fact that BB was
misinformed. There was and there is no indication that the Georgia program will not open up. Our
Dept. of State website also states that the program would open in Sept. As of now I can give you a
referral of that little girl and present your dossier to the Ministry. You said that you would wait a month.
During that time the new adoption legislation was approved by the appropriate committee and is
scheduled to be voted on by parliament in a week or so.
I am happy to say that everything is on track but a bit delayed. I know the waiting is hard for you as you have waited quite sometime now. And I do empathize but there is only so much our representative in-country can do and she has been working night and day on behalf of all the families that are waiting as long as you have.
with aloha,
lee
Denise’s August email was not even referred to. Either Hubbard was lying or Slater was. For once we cannot lay the blame on Denise Hubbard. She merely passed along erroneous information from Slater to Janet.
Slater did not give evidence of how “hard” her in-country representative was working. She did not offer to connect Janet with other families she was working with. She did not do much to explain the Georgian process, nor did she give an explanation as to why the Georgian infant program had been shut down. She didn’t bother to explain why the Georgian legislature didn’t meet or if they had, why international adoptions were not resuming full force.
One thing Slater never did: return Janet’s dossier or refund any fees. Had she refunded any money to BBAS like Dennis Kaselak had done for us?
These useless, purposeless emails continued. In mid-October, Slater maintained Georgia would open in September. Georgia’s parliament was scheduled to vote at the end of that month. September 30 came and went with no vote in parliament and no resumption of Georgian infant placements. Janet emailed Slater asking about if parliament had passed the legislation in September.
From: Lee Slater
To: Janet Ostrander
Sent: Friday, October 15, 2004 12:35 AM
Subject: Re: Check out Georgia - International Adoption
As re: Azerbaijan: We believe that is why they closed the program. We have no control over what goes on
internally in any of the countries that we work with. We assume that the person or persons we work with
have integrity and they come highly recommended. I truly cannot believe that the children that we placed
from Azerbaijan were " trafficked". These children were in the orphanage for over 6 months and had signs
of malnutrition.
As re: Georgia:
the state dept is more optimistic than we are. They say the program will open
in Sept.
we believe it will open by the end of this month.
Slater’s contacts must have been a month behind our calendar. Or else Slater didn’t know what a calendar was. And how is one to “assume” one’s contacts in a foreign country have integrity? Who so highly recommended them? Were they as virtuous and humanitarian as those Lauryn Galindo had used in Cambodia?
It went on like this until Nov. 1. She again asked Slater point-blank about the refund:
Hi Lee.....on August 13, 2004 Denise Hubbard sent you an email asking for my entire dossier back
along with a full refund. Have you refunded Denise Hubbard at Building Blocks Adoption any monies,
and how much?
Again Slater responded:
From: Lee Slater
To: Janet Ostrander
Sent: Monday, November 01, 2004 6:55 PM
Subject: Re: please respond asap
Janet, Your dossier is in Georgia and it would cost an additional $100 for it to be returned. I do
not advise you make a further investment as the documents are specific to Georgia and it would
cost you less to replace those documents that are not.
Your paperwork fee was used to process, certify, legalize, and translate your documents in additionto all the express fees that were expended on your behalf.
I again would advise you to continue with the adoption process in Georgia as you said you wanted asecond child anyway. That little boy that I showed you is still available and/or we can give you a
referral of an infant. All we are waiting for is the length of time he/she will have to stay in the
orphanage and that information should come within the next few weeks as the legislation is already
written and is the next bill that will be voted on. You can check with the web site of the state dept
or e-mail directly to the consular officer in Tiblisi Consulate, Tbilisi <Consulate-Tbilisi@state.gov>
Wishing you happiness in whatever choices you make.
Again, Slater avoided Janet’s question about a full refund. How convenient her money had been eaten up by the paperwork process. The idea that Janet would send $100 for the dossier’s return is ludicrous. After all, it was Janet who had already spent hundreds of dollars gathering the documents and traveling to get them authenticated. Slater was deluded in thinking Janet would pay her one red cent to retrieve her dossier. The dossier should have been returned to Janet immediately, no strings attached.
It makes no sense Janet’s paperwork fee was used for processing her dossier. If the country was closed, who was processing the documents? Which governmental department in Georgia had received those documents? Where were the receipts proving her documents had indeed been “expressed” to Georgia?
How much of a cut had Slater taken out of those fees? Was her cut for her legal defense for the lawsuit with the Hawaiian HIC client?
The Georgian parliament must not vote on adoption legislation. Or Lee Slater likes lying to clients and stringing them along, baiting them with the prospect of a true referral from a country that was closed to international adoption.
That was it. Janet decided to walk. As of this writing, June 2005, Georgia is at a trickle and Azerbaijan is closed to foreign adoptions. If Janet had hung on with Lee Slater and her highly recommended facilitators, she’d still be waiting on a true, official referral from Georgia.
It’s humorous. As late as Dec. 16, after Janet had walked away from Georgian adoption, Slater continued to send her shady referrals! Here is an example:
Janet, We have a 10 month old boy who is available immediately from
Georgia. It would make a nice Christmas present. What do you say??????
Janet’s response? Aloha, Lee.