By
Moira Warburton, Washington USA
The United States imposed
sanctions on four Ugandans on Monday, including two judges, accusing them of
participating in a fraudulent adoption scam, the U.S. Treasury Department said
in a statement.Justice Wilson Musalu Musene
The Treasury accused Ugandan judges Moses
Mukiibi and Wilson Musalu Musene, lawyer Dorah Mirembe and her husband, Patrick
Ecobu, of participating in a scheme that removed Ugandan children from their
families under a promise of “special education” programs and study in the
United States, and instead offered them to American families for adoption.
“Deceiving innocent Ugandan families into
giving up their children for adoption has caused great suffering,” Deputy
Treasury Secretary Justin Muzinich said in a statement. “The individuals
involved in this corrupt scam deliberately exploited the good faith of Ugandans
and Americans to enrich themselves.”
Monday’s action freezes any U.S. assets of
those blacklisted and generally bars Americans from dealing with them. The
State Department also barred Mukiibi and Musene from traveling to the United
States.
The Treasury said Mirembe’s law firm promised
vulnerable families in remote villages that their children would be moved to
Kampala for education, where American prospective adoptive parents then
traveled to adopt children from an unlicensed children’s home.
The Treasury also accused Mirembe, with help
from Ecobu, of facilitating multiple bribes to judges Mukiibi and Musene.
In a separate action, the Department of Justice on Monday said it had charged Mirembe and an American, Debra Parris of Lake Dallas, Texas, in an indictment filed last week with money laundering and violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in connection with the alleged Ugandan scheme.
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