More nuns to be questioned in stolen baby cases

María Gómez Valbuena

SPAIN (Agencies and other sources) Early last month, Sister María Gómez Valbuena, 80, of the Daughters of Charity order of nuns, appeared in court to be questioned about cases of stolen babies and to answer charges that she stole a child from a mother and gave her to another family in the early 1980s. The only person so far charged officially in the case, she refused to answer any questions. Now another nun of the same order, Sister Juana Alonso, 97 and Mother Superior of the Daughters of Charity in Tenerife from 1951 to 1970, is under suspicion of transporting babies from the peninsula to the Canaries. This, according to Liberia Hernández, who says that Sister Juana put her up for illegal adoption in 1962, when she was allegedly given to the Alcoy family aged eight, and without her biological mother's consent. There are some 1,500 official cases of stolen babies throughout the country, ranging from the mid 1940s to as recently as 1999, though several of the earlier ones have been dismissed in court for lack of evidence.(Look out for a forthcoming article on this subject.) PLEASE BE AWARE THAT ITEMS SUCH AS THIS MAY BE SUBJECT TO SUBSCRIPTION IN THE FUTURE but you can make a donation NOW, too! Please click here for more information on how to help us continue.