Local family loses adopted daughter to Indian Child Welfare Act

A Washington family is calling for changes to what they believe is an “outdated” law that essentially took their adopted daughter and put her life in limbo.

Alyssa Olsen, from Washington, told KIRO Radio’s Dori Monson that her family was hand-picked to adopt an 18-week-old child in January. However, she says the child was abruptly taken on March 4 under the Indian Child Welfare Act, a federal law that aims to give tribal governments a voice in child custody cases involving American Indian children.

“After a month of being in our home we actually had a tribal social services agency show up at our door with a court order that took our little girl out of our home without any notice,” she said.

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The situation has similarities to one in Los Angeles, where authorities removed a 6-year-old girl from her longtime foster family earlier this week. That girl is 1.5 percent Choctawwas and was also removed under the federal act.

Olsen says her adopted daughter is half Native American, with a birth mother who was white and a Native American father. Olsen said the father had little knowledge of the girl because he has an extensive criminal history.

“The mother had fled kind of a violent situation there and because of the adoption laws, he needed to be informed prior to our being able to legally adopt this little girl,” she said. “As soon as he was informed, his tribe found out and his tribe actually circumvented both birth mother and birth father and took legal action on their own without any interference with the parent.”

A spokesperson for Washington State Department of Social and Health Services Indian Child Welfare office could not be reached for comment.

Olsen called the experience “extremely traumatic,” noting that her husband did not have a chance to say goodbye to the child. But she said she feels even worse for the birth mother.

“One of the most heart-breaking parts about this has been thinking about this birth mother and what she must be going through now that she has had her courageous and selfless decision for her daughter completely trampled on because of this outdated law that is being misused,” Olsen said.

Olsen said they are fighting to regain custody but that the girl will now go through the foster system.

“She is at 6 months of age in her third home and she will be in that home likely until her court date in which they decide to either place her permanently into a fourth home or keep her in the tribal system until a decision about where she should live, and who should be raising her, can be made,” she said.

Olsen said she believes the child’s time with her family was beneficial.

“In the months that we were able to be with her she became a different baby,” she said. “By the time we had to say goodbye she was smiling and interacting and very much knew who my husband and I were and our son. She was our baby girl.”

“Our biggest concern is how formative these first few months of life are for a child and the fact that she’s had so much unrest during this time,” she added.

Olsen said the law doesn’t appear to be taking the children’s best interest into consideration anymore.

“We are paying for the sins of those who went before us,” she said. “We completely agree and understand that this law needed to be created, because there was a lot of discrimination and a lot of abuse of power against the Native population. That’s not why this law is being called upon now. Now it’s serving a purpose that just really does not make sense. It’s these children that are suffering.”

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