Return to sender

1. Return to sender A Current Event By Megan Dhaliwal

2. Who? • There are 3 main people in the article. • The adoptee Artyem Saviliev, renamed Justin Artyem Hansen. • The foster mother and grandmother, Torry & Nancy Hansen.

3. What? • A 7 year old Russian adoptee was sent back to Moscow from Tennessee on a plane alone. His adopted grandmother flew with him to Washington, then dropped him off at the airport to be sent back to Russia with a note saying they no longer wanted to parent this child. They paid a driver 200$ to drive the boy from Moscow’s Domodedovo airport to the Ministry of Education in Russia. When he got there officials found his U.S. passport, adoption documentation and Torry Hansen’s letter in his backpack.

4. When? • The article was written on April 9 2010. Torry Hansen adopted Artyem 6 months before that. So he was adopted around September- October. • He was traveling on and expired U.S. visa.

5. Where? • Torry Hansen lives in Shelbyville, Tennessee. Nancy accompanied Artyem on a flight to Washington where she put him on a plane as and unaccompanied minor. The plane landed at Moscow’s Domodedovo airport. From there a driver drove him to the Russian Ministry of Education. Then he was sent for a Medical Evaluation.

6. Why? • Torry said she did it for safety. She told Associated Press (AP) that the child began hitting, kicking, spitting and making threats in January. • In her letter Torry wrote “This child is mentally unstable. He is violent and has severe psychopathic issues/behaviors. I was lied to and misled by the Russian Orphanage workers and directors regarding his mental stability and other issues.” • “He drew a picture of our house burning down and he’ll tell anybody that he’s going to burn our house down with us in it,” Nancy said. “It got to be where you feared for your safety. It was terrible. • A friend and neighbor of the Hansen’s (He only identified himself as Mr. Austen) said the Hansen’s were a nice family and the boy caused many problems, including setting fires and trying to burn the house down.

7. How does Russia feel? • Russian is overwhelmed with anger about what has happened. They have put a stop to any adoptions to American families until Russia and the U.S. sign an international agreement. • Russian President Dmitry Medvedev called Artyems abrupt return “ monstrous deed.” The Russian president told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos in an exclusive interview that he had a “special concern” about the recent treatment of Russian children adopted by Americans. • Some people disagree. Adam Pertman says “There are lessons to be learned for this. Ensuring that all the other kids that need loving homes don’t get them in not the way to solve the problem.”

8. The Other Side of the Story • U.S. embassy officials were immediately contacted and they met Artyem at the hospital he was being examined at. He was physically fine according to Russian media reports, but Kremlin’s Children Rights Commissioner Pavel Astakhov told reporters outside the hospital that he is traumatized by the ordeal. • Artyem cried when he was asked about his American family, saying the mother used to pull his hair and his grandmother always shouted at him.

9. Other adoptions gone wrong! • Virginia mother Peggy Sue Hilt is serving 25 years in prison for the beating death of her 2 year old adopted daughter from Russia Nina. Peggy told ABC News’ “20/20” that from the beginning Nina was impossible to handle. She was prone to banging her head against things. Then one day Peggy began drinking in secret and finally lost her patience. “Nina picked up a fork off the table and went towards her sister with it and I saw red. I grabbed her and I snapped. I hurt her. I didn’t mean to hurt her. Then I kicked her with the side of my foot and told her to get up and then I put her up in her bed and struck her repeatedly” Peggy said. • Fifteen cases of Russian children murdered by their parents have been recorded in the United States since the early 1990s, causing worry on the part of Russian and American officials. “While there is no behavior that can excuse child abuse”, Adam Pertman (executive of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute) said “Orphans in Russia are often institutionalized and, as a general rule institutionalized children suffer higher rates of attachment and behavioral disorders.

10. More… • Experts say most adoptions from Russia end well. But a series of highly exposed cases of parents who say their Russian children come with numerous mental and behavioral issues, some to the point of extreme violence, have cast a diminish both on the country’s orphanage system and the American parents who sign up to take on the children. • “ You can not live in an institution for years and suffer no consequences,” said Adam Pertman. The answer he said lays with the foreign countries minimizing damaging environments for children and United State adoption agencies doing a better job of vetting and education potential adoptive parents. “Of course you heart breaks for this child. People should not get the impression that all Russian kids have these problems.” Adam said of Artyem • According to government statistics, the number of Russian child adopted to U.S. families has sharply declined in the last 10 years, down from a high of 5,862 in 2004 to 1,586 last year.

11. Facts about Russia? • Russia is the largest country in the world covering 17.1 million square kilometer. • 145.5 million people live in Russia. Almost 80% concentrated in Western Russia. • Russian is the official language. • Russia’s capital is Moscow.

12. Facts about Tennessee • The capital is Nashville. • The population is about 6,296,254. • The birth place of country music. • Tennessee is the 17th largest state.

13. Why I Chose this Article • The reason I chose this article is because I am really interested in foreign adoptions. And when I heard about what happened I wanted to know why someone would put a 7 year old boy on a plane by himself. I also wanted to learn more about adoptions. And it really caught my eye when I was looking through the newspaper to find a article for this projects.