Karen Lane, Attorney at Law Karen Lane sold the baby we were adopting to a couple that were not her clients and kept the majority of the money we had given her. Santa Monica CA

Karen Lane is by far, the most corrupt & evil person I have ever encountered. She preys on people who are trying to adopt a child to start their family. We hired her and were asked to give her $5,500 up front in order to start our process. We later found out that this was "deemed earned" upon receipt which meant that once we found out how corrupt she was, there was no way to get our money back, regardless of whether she did anything on our case.

She asked us to do a series of things including putting together a Family Bio Sheet to show expectant mothers who were looking to give their baby up for adoption as well as give her more money to run expensive ads in something similar to the old "Pennysaver". She asked us to do that several times and I later found out that was more for her benefit then ours. She asked us to refer all calls to her and I believe that this was to find potential babies for other clients (long story, but nothing was ever for our benefit). 

We told her very specifically what we were looking for, yet she kept trying to talk us into other babies. When she finally found us an expectant mother whose baby seemed like she would be a good match for us, she demanded a fee of around $17,000/$18,000. We were told that we would be guaranteed a baby even if this didn't work out, but what she didn't tell us was that there was no time frame for that and we would never see our money again. So, in other words, she could present us with babies that she knew we wouldn't be interested in for the rest of our natural lives and therefore, we would never have our baby.

She lied to us about the expectant mother she matched us with and called her an "opportunistic drug user" meaning that she only used drugs occasionally if they happened to be offered to her. We quickly found out that this was NOT the case at all. In fact, when we were finally given medical records on the expectant mother, she was doing drugs interveneously at the hospital (a month or two prior to her actually giving birth)! She was a total druggie. Karen also refused to communicate with her and put me in charge with finding her daily housing at various motels(she would thrash every room she was put in while on drugs with her boyfriend and the motels would kick her out). We pulled out of the adoption at that point for fear the baby would be addicted to meth. 

Karen then set up this woman to give her baby to a woman approximately 50+ years old with a 92 year old boyfriend. For some reason that I was never told, Karen pulled that adoption from that woman and also, did not return her money. At that point, the baby had been born and Karen called me to inform me that the baby was born and was not addicted to drugs. Would I be interested? I said, yes, of course and asked to speak to the presiding Doctor. At first Karen said "yes", but then later, said "no", with no explanation leaving me to try to figure out what the signs would be for a baby withdrawing from drugs. 

We drove to the hospital in Woodland Hills where the baby was born on a Friday. After driving for three hours in traffic, we were asked to wait for at least an hour, while the expectant mother met with a gay couple who she had never met and had not retained Karen Lane's services at that point. Our birthmother, who I had housed and built a relationship for a few months, was now being presented with an alternative to Karen's clients (us) who had paid a retainer for her services. I later found out this was because she already had our money and if she could convince the gay couple to adopt this child and convince the expectant mother to choose them, she would get an entirely new set of fees (thus, collecting three sets of legal and matching fees for one baby). Getting the picture now?

The baby's mother had never met the other couple so I wasn't worried at the time of her choosing them over us (not to mention, it wasn't legal for Karen to even present a couple against her own client's interests)!!! However, what I didn't know (that the baby's mother later told me) was that she was bribed by Karen with cash of $8,500, a paid for flight out to CA for her boyfriend with a shopping spree on Rodeo Drive. She was also threatened her with jail letting the baby's mother know that she had taken money from three different families for her baby and that was illegal (all Karen's doing, but the baby's mother was a young girl who didn't know that). With all of that, the baby's mother felt no option but to choose the gay couple she just met. 

A day later, when Karen wasn't around, the baby's mother called me and told me what happened. She said she really wanted my husband and I to raise her baby girl and wanted to know how we could make that happen. We told her not to sign any legal paperwork (shes supposed to wait two weeks by CA Law, but Karen was trying to rush it on a legal technicality). We also asked her to tell Karen of her wishes. When she did, Karen took her cell phone away from her and gave her a prescription of Oxycontin and Xaanex (a lethal combination). The expectant mother was addicted to Xaanex so this was an easy way to keep the baby's mother under control until she could be forced to sign the legal papers. 

As much as we tried to coordinate getting the baby's mother away from Karen to an attorney we were going to hire for her, Karen had her completely drugged up and out of control. Even the possibility of the baby's mother dying from this lethal combination of drugs didn't matter to Karen. She was going to force this adoption no matter what. 

I tried to report Karen to the police, but without being related to the baby's mother or being the official "foster parent" of the baby, we had no rights. We reported Karen to the Bar and were told that she had been reported numerous times for various acts of fraud regarding adoption. However, it is our belief that she has some type of paid off connection there because, despite all of the complaints, they haven't stripped her of her license. All they would say to us is that if someone asked, they would not reccommend her. 

I wrote a Yelp review on Karen to protect others from having their baby sold to the highest bidder as well as breaking them emotionally and financially. Karen threatened to sue me for 1M if I didn't take my Yelp review down. I told  her to do it. I would love that because it would allow me to go public in a very big way and warn even more people about her. Possibly spark an FBI investigation into baby trafficking and expectant mother trafficking. She never sued. Maybe because she knows I have proof? 

We ended up adopting two beautiful babies on our own. We were too afraid to trust anyone after our experience with her. Karen called our Social Services Agency where we did our Homestudy and tried to get them to block us from adopting, but the agency saw right through her. 

I only wish I could have saved the countless other couples who I heard from after my Yelp review from being taken advantage by this awful excuse of a human being. Hopefully, this will help her future potential victims. It breaks my heart to know that there are people like her out there preying on the hopes and dreams of innocent people. There's a special place in Hell for her, so if she isn't put in jail in this lifetime, I'm confident she will be well taken care of in the next.