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Over 30,000 children in Guatemala were adopted internationally decades ago, and learned they were trafficked for adoption.
Seeking answers
The memory of the day Osmin Tobar was taken from his mother in Guatemala has been replaying in his head like a broken record since he was seven years old.
Guatemalan authorities took him in 1997 after they allegedly received reports that he had been abused and abandoned by his mother — allegations they didn’t bother to verify. Instead, Tobar was whisked away and spent two years in a children’s home before a family in Pennsylvania adopted him.
“The biggest motivation I had to return to Guatemala was the memory of my mother,” Tobar, 30, a father of two boys, told NBC News.
As Tobar yearned to be reunited with his mother for over a decade while living in the U.S., his father, who had been separated from his mother, was trying to reverse a declaration of abandonment — the legal move that allowed the Guatemalan government to put Tobar up for international adoption without his father’s consent.
Tobar left Pennsylvania and moved to Guatemala after reconnecting with his biological parents in 2011. However, he has struggled with keeping a good relationship with both his biological and adoptive families.
In 2016, he took his case to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in Costa Rica. He declared that no one asked him whether his mother mistreated him before putting him up for international adoption.
Tobar also said that authorities didn’t ask him whether he preferred to live with another family member before being taken to a children’s home.
Tobar’s declaration made him the first person to win a case against Guatemala over fraudulent adoptions. As a result, the Guatemalan government was forced to admit it enabled years of misconduct.
“That day in court made me realize this was bigger than just me,” Tobar said. “It gave me more passion and fire to be outspoken and not be afraid of holding people accountable.”
While Tobar is still waiting on the Guatemalan government to make reparations on his case, the woman who facilitated his adoption is currently serving an 18-year sentence for child trafficking.
Source NBC NEWS.
Listen to Osmin Tobar at the Adoption Trafficking Awareness Symposium on June 18th, 2022, at the Washington State History Museum. Get tickets here.
OSMIN’S 2024 UPDATE:
Guatemala Issues Historic Apology for Black Market Adoptions
Osmin Ricardo Tobar Ramirez Osmin Ricardo Tobar Ramirez shaking hands with the Guatemalan President, Bernardo Arévalo
Guatemala’s president on Friday offered an official apology to one of the many families whose children were taken away and adopted abroad in a multimillion-dollar black market. Osmin Tobar and his brother J.R. were seven and two years old when they were picked up by officials in a poor district of Guatemala City in 1997, ostensibly for having being abandoned.
Tobar was adopted by a family in the US city of Pittsburgh. His brother suffered a similar fate, although his whereabouts are unknown. “On behalf of the state… I apologize publicly for the events of which you were victims,” President Bernardo Arevalo said at an event in Guatemala City. The state’s role in the incident “has no justification,” he added.
Osmin Ricardo Tobar Ramirez
Tobar welcomed the apology, which he said “recognizes past mistakes and signals a commitment to justice and integrity.” “This apology is more than symbolic — it recognizes the pain endured by those affected and will pave the way for healing and progress,” the 34-year-old added. Tobar, who has a wife and a son, said that the loss of a sense of identity had led him to become addicted to drugs and alcohol.
He said that he was sharing his story “to raise awareness about the darkness of human trafficking, advocate laws that focus on the preservation of families, and offer hope to survivors in the shadows. “His mother, Flor Ramirez, said that she had been devastated by the separation from her sons.
Osmin Ricardo Tobar Ramirez
