Trial begins in Spain of first ‘stolen babies’ case

Aformer doctor will go on trial tomorrow in Madrid for allegedly stealing a newborn baby from her mother and giving her to another woman, a practice thought to have affected thousands of families during Spain’s dictatorship.

Eduardo Vela, an 85-year-old former obstetrician at Madrid’s San Ramon hospital, will become the first person in the dock over the “stolen babies” scandal, a dark chapter of the repressive Franco era that shook Spain when it eventually came to light in the 2000s.

Vela is suspected of having taken part in the 1969 theft of Ines Madrigal, now aged 49. She accuses him of having forged her birth certificate so that her adoptive mother, who has since passed away, appeared as her biological parent.

When she turned 18, Madrigal’s adoptive mother told her she had been adopted.

Then in 2010 she read an article about the “stolen babies” affair which described the hospital where she was born as a central point of child trafficking in the 1960s and 70s in the final years of the dictatorship.

“I thought ... my God, don’t tell me that this is my case,” Madrigal, a railway worker who now lives in the southeastern region of Murcia, said ahead of the trial.

She did some digging and discovered that her birth certificate was falsified.

“It was a huge blow,” Madrigal said.

2,000 other complaints

Vela will be tried for falsifying official documents, illegal adoption, unlawful detention and falsifying the registration of a birth. His lawyer Rafael Casas declined to comment when contacted by AFP.

Madrigal’s adoptive mother, Ines Perez, said Vela told her to fake a pregnancy and to only consult him if her adopted daughter became sick.

Campaigners say at least 2,000 other complaints for similar cases have been filed with the courts.