More legal issues for mom of adoptee

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LEWISBURG, Tenn., June 21 (UPI) -- A woman who sent her adopted son back to Russia in 2010 is attempting to modify a $150,000 judgment against her, court records indicate.

Torry Hansen, formerly of Shelbyville, Tenn., sparked an international incident and a lawsuit from the adoption agency World Association for Children and Parents, which sought child support when she put her son Artyom Saveliev onto a plane to Moscow with a letter explaining the child was violent, had psychological problems and that she no longer wanted him, the Shelbyville, Tenn., Times-Gazette said.

The judgment was entered when Hansen failed to appear for a scheduled court hearing in February, and never responded to the amended suit filed against her. She has hired an attorney, former U.S. prosecutor Edward M. Yarbrough of Nashville, the newspaper said.

Motions filed in Marshall County (Tenn.) Courthouse on Friday ask that the default judgment be set aside, amended or altered, stating that her request were "excusable in view of the circumstances that surround those failures and the mental condition" of Hansen at the time.

The motions also claim her failure to appear was due to mistakes made by "a combination of bad advice and fear," and that she was without an attorney when the default judgment was granted.