UPDATE/ Fla. woman in adoption scam gets more prison time

If you recall, this is the woman who adopted a lot of kids in N.Y. and then
moved to Fla. with them.

Fla. woman in adoption scam gets more prison time

Posted: Today at 11:08 a.m.
Updated: 4 minutes ago

FORT PIERCE, Fla. - A Florida woman accused of abusing 11 disabled children
she adopted - while pocketing more than $1 million in subsidies - has been
sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Circuit Judge Robert Belanger on Wednesday called Judith Leekin's actions
"reprehensible" and handed down the maximum punishment allowed in the plea
agreement. Leekin, 63, pleaded no contest to four counts of aggravated child
abuse and four counts of aggravated abuse of disabled adults. The adoptees
are now in their mid-teens and 20s.

"I'm very sorry," Leekin said several times during a brief statement to the
court.

Leekin's public defender, Diamond Litty, told the Associated Press on
Thursday that the sentence was "fair and appropriate."

Leekin was arrested in July 2007 after police were called to a supermarket
where authorities said she'd abandoned an 18-year-old girl.

Authorities say they found the adopted children had been held like prisoners
in Leekin's home, often handcuffed together and forced to soil themselves
because they were not allowed to use the bathroom. They said they had never
seen a doctor or a dentist and had not been allowed to attend school or
leave the house. All were near starvation when they were found.

Leekin used four aliases to adopt from different agencies and created fake
report cards to show the children's progress, even though they were not
attending school, according to court records and officials. The children
were adopted in New York City before Leekin moved to Florida in 1998.

New York City records show she received more than $1.2 million in subsidies
for the disabled children she had adopted.

Leekin, who moved to the U.S. from Trinidad, was sentenced in July in New
York federal court to nearly 11 years in prison for fraud. That sentence
will run concurrently with the Florida prison term.


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