FBI Busts Surrogacy Scam

Three women recently pled guilty in San Diego, admitting to taking part in a scheme to illegally create an inventory of babies to sell to unwitting would-be parents for fees of between $100,000 and $150,000 each.

The three took advantage of couples who desperately wanted children, offering them seemingly legitimate surrogacy situations. They also took advantage of women recruited as “gestational carriers” to carry pregnancies to term after having embryos transferred to their uteruses.

The defendants in this case included two lawyers who specialized in reproductive law: Theresa Erickson, a well-known California attorney, and Hilary Neiman, who operated an adoption/surrogacy agency in Maryland. The third conspirator was Carla Chambers of Nevada, who served as the “surrogacy facilitator.” Together, they circumvented surrogacy regulations that say contracts between surrogates and intended parents must be executed before a pregnancy occurs… and lied to surrogates, intended parents, and the California family court.

Here’s how the scam worked: Chambers admitted visiting adoption/surrogacy-themed online chat rooms and forums in search of surrogates and parents. Erickson and Neiman also used their own sterling reputations to legitimize the scheme.  

Surrogates were made to travel to Ukraine in Eastern Europe to become implanted with embryos derived from anonymous donors—Chambers usually made all the arrangements—with the promise that they would be compensated by the intended parents. The women were led to believe that they were participating in legal surrogacy arrangements and that there was a waiting list of potential parents for the babies. They also had to agree to give birth in California.

They were promised quick matches with intended parents, but the co-conspirators usually waited until the second or even third trimester of the pregnancies before seeking parents. Neiman and Erickson then drafted contracts between the surrogates and intended parents, well after the time frame required by law.

The hopeful couples were told the unborn babies were the result of legitimate surrogacy arrangements, but the original intended parents had backed out. They were offered the opportunity to “assume” the non-existent surrogacy agreement. The parents would hand over between $100,000 and $150,000 to the defendants, but less than half of that went to the surrogate—Erickson, Neiman, and Chambers pocketed the rest.