Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Attorney: Man in adoption case ‘made happy families’
SALT LAKE CITY — An Arizona adoption attorney facing federal human trafficking charges in Arkansas is a being publicly vilified, his attorney argued after a Utah court hearing Friday.
Paul Petersen was licensed to practice adoption law in Arizona, Arkansas and Utah. He now faces a 19-count federal indictment in Arkansas and state charges in the other two states, all related to accusations he illegally offered money to women from the Marshall Islands to come to those states and give up their babies for adoption.
Defense attorney Scott Williams said Petersen “has made happy families for 15 years, that’s what he has done open and notoriously.”
Petersen entered “not guilty” pleas in earlier court proceedings in Arizona and Arkansas. State court in Utah took no plea in a hearing in which he was formally notified of the charges against him there. Those Utah charges include human smuggling, fraud and sale of a child. Prosecutors in Arizona, Utah and Arkansas say he paid women up to $10,000 to come to the United States to give up their babies in at least 70 adoption cases.
Duane “Dak” Kees, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Arkansas, estimated Petersen arranged 30 or more adoptions a year in Arkansas alone. Washington County Circuit Court records show 19 birth mothers were in this region at the time of Petersen’s arrest last
month. In Arizona, Petersen also is charged with falsely registering the women for state Medicaid benefits.
Marshall Islands citizens have been prohibited from traveling to the U.S. for adoption purposes since 2003.
The case has drawn condemnation from the Marshall Islands’ president, as well as a leader of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Petersen completed a mission in the Marshall Islands for the church in the late 1990s.
Ronald Rasband, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, has said he was “disgusted” by the charges, and the church plans to review Petersen’s membership.
Petersen’s attorney said his client has been vilified before his side of the story comes out. Petersen himself didn’t speak and Williams didn’t dispute any specific allegations on Friday but said the adoption practice was legitimate and Petersen had support from some in the Marshallese community.
Petersen also is fighting for his elected office as Maricopa County, Ariz., assessor after being suspended by the county’s board of supervisors.