A couple have spoken out after being tricked by an ‘adoption scammer’ – who made them believe they were going to become parents to her unborn baby.
Karli Johnson, 34, and husband, Blake, 35, from Nevada, have spent the past five years hoping to adopt a baby girl to complete their family after having two sons.
They were thrilled after being approached by a woman who said she wanted them to adopt her unborn baby girl – and excitedly awaited scan photos and updates on her pregnancy while they decorated the nursery and picked out names.
But they were left devastated after they discovered the woman they were speaking to, who called herself Skylar, would not be handing over her baby – nor indeed was she actually pregnant.
But rather, they had fallen victim to a scammer who got kicks out of misleading hopeful adoptive parents.
Karli Johnson, 34, and husband, Blake, 35, from Nevada, have spent the past five years hoping to adopt a baby girl to complete their family after having two sons, pictured
Karli was left distraught when she found out the birth mother she thought was going to give her the baby girl she had been hoping for was in fact a cruel scammer tormenting adoptive parents
The scammer, called Skylar, 19, pretending to be pregnant and contacted the couple. Eventually they uncovered she had lied
Karli said: ‘We’ve always wanted a baby girl to complete our family and thought private adoption was the perfect way to go, as using an agency to find a match comes with extremely long waiting lists.
‘I was so excited when I got sent a text message from someone claiming to be a 19-year-old girl called ‘Skylar’.
‘I remember it so clearly, as I was in my home office working on holiday gifts for my boys, and I was just sobbing, it felt like our prayers had finally been answered.
‘She presented herself in such a way that just really tailored to me as a whole, which, looking back, meant she’d gone through my social media and had really done her research before reaching out to me.
Karli and Blake, pictured, had started preparing for the new baby and decorated the nursery when the scam was revealed
The couple had two sons together, but wanted to complete their family by adopting a girl. They thought their dreams were about to come true
‘She told us she was due May 30, 2022, and was 14 weeks pregnant at the time.
‘She even sent across someone else’s scan photos as proof, and whenever I requested videos or photos, she somehow always had them to hand.
‘She acted like we’d be the perfect parents, as she had blonde hair, and so did I, she was of a petite build and so was I, so her baby girl would look very similar to myself.
‘The scam has left us completely devastated.’
The couple, from Nevada, US, decided to share their adoption story over social media in the hope women putting their babies up for adoption, would reach out.
An exchange of texts show how the scammer contacted Karli, pretending to be an ‘expectant mama’
The couple have been trying to adopt a girl for five years, having been rejected by another birth mother in 2017
Text exchanges show Karli and Skylar discussing a baby shower for the baby girl ahead of her birth. It turned out Skylar had lied about being pregnant
In the US, privately handled adoptions are not outlawed as they are in other countries, so expectant mothers and adoptive families can match or make a placement whilst working with their own attorneys.
The family, who already had two biological sons, had been trying to find a baby girl to adopt and add to their family for almost five years.
In 2017, they matched privately with a birth mother, but she ended up choosing a different adoptive family, leaving them crushed.
‘It was a really tough blow, and we didn’t want to risk that disappointment again too soon, so it wasn’t until the end of last year when we decided to try our luck again.
Skylar went as far as pretending she had delivered the baby – who didn’t actually exist. Karli sent her congratulations, thinking the baby had been born
Skylar pretended to be different person and broke the news to Karli that the birth mother had given birth, which was a lie
‘We first posted our story on a website designed for hopeful adoptive families, as well as putting up a post on Instagram to make sure we had all avenues covered.’
After striking up a relationship with Skylar, Karli spoke to her regularly over the coming weeks.
Karli said: ‘I was so invested, and we were talking back and forth non-stop for two weeks.
‘She’d ticked all the boxes and had photos including scan pictures. She came off as so sweet and cooperative, it felt magical.
‘Then all of a sudden, she turned violent and angry, and became really abusive over her text messages.
Mother-of-two Karli has been left broken by Skylar’s lies and reveal their exchanges soon turned abusive
At some point, the scammer also pretending to be another birth mother, called Emma, who also changed her mind
‘She began saying awful things like she was going to dismember my family in front of me and set fire to my house with them inside.
‘It was shocking, I didn’t know what to do! If I didn’t respond she’d try calling me and would spam me with horrible messages.
‘As she was based in Louisville, Kentucky, we were planning to fly out several times for things like scans, but when it came to booking the flights, she’d have one of her episodes where she’d lash out and tell us we weren’t good enough and say awful things.
‘But my mind was fogged by the promise of a baby girl, so I just dealt with the messages when she passed them off as pregnancy hormones, even though they were affecting my mental health.
‘Yet she’d become nice again, and I believed all of the horribleness was over.’
Karli continued to speak with the scammer over messages and calls but started to notice the abusive behavior was repeating itself and becoming a frequent pattern.
Karli also started receiving messages on Instagram from other ‘expectant mothers’ looking to give up their baby, all communicating in a similar way to ‘Skylar’.
She continued: ‘My mental health was truly in the gutter, I finally decided to cut off all contact with Skylar in January, as I couldn’t handle the violent outbursts and harassment anymore.
‘I’d gone on a four-day business trip, and she decided to harass my husband, Blake, instead.
‘She called him a pedophile when he told her he told her he didn’t want to speak to her privately, and all communication between her and our family needed to be through a group chat with myself in.
‘Then I started receiving Instagram messages from fake profiles she’d created, telling me he was disgusting, and I was married to a pedophile.
‘We decided very quickly we wanted a closed adoption, as we didn’t want to deal with Skylar any longer, but still believed she had a baby.
‘We went through an agency, and she never showed up to the meetings or the zoom calls.
‘In March she was still playing mind games. Messaging about how we wouldn’t be a good family anyway, but then asking if we still wanted to adopt as her baby had been born prematurely – but we no longer believed her.’
Karli and Blake were due to celebrate their anniversary in Bora Bora mid-March when they received a message from ‘Emma’ who claimed she’d given birth and wanted them to be her baby’s new parents.
Karli adds: ‘We were in shock, we were about to fly on holiday, when this woman messaged.
‘Emma told us she was in Louisiana, and she wanted us to have the baby straight away.
Skylar was abusive towards Karlie and taunted her, asking her if her children were ‘dead yet’ in one cruel exchange
The scammer called Karli’s husband Blake a ‘child molester’ and said her daughter – who didn’t exist – deserved better
‘We were really considering it, until she text me to say, ‘a woman called Skylar is threatening me’ and I realized it was still Skylar playing mind games, as I’d never given Emma my number.
‘It was another devastating blow, and I couldn’t believe we nearly cancelled our holiday for this deranged person who got off on our desperation for a daughter.’
As Karli and Blake’s scammer never asked for money, ‘Skylar’ cannot be prosecuted. Karli has since worked with the FBI in order to try to prosecute but they were unable to.
She’s now lobbying for reform so laws will hopefully be in place in the future to prosecute such scammers and to prevent this from happening to anyone else.
Karli adds: ‘I’m still reeling from the experience, and hope by sharing my story, other people make sure to take the right precautions before talking to potential mothers online.
‘You should definitely do a Facetime call first, that’s where I failed. I just assumed with the scammer claiming to be a teen, they’d prefer to communicate differently.’
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