TAIPEI, Taiwan -- A 31-year-old mother pleaded innocent to charges of selling dozens of babies -- some of them believed kidnapped - to childless couples in the United States and elsewhere, court sources said Friday.
Julie Chu, accused of leading what police called a 'baby export' syndicate, made her plea of innocence in the first court hearing into the case Thursday.
Chu, the mother of a 1-year-old boy, told the court she did not send the babies abroad for profit and had the consent of the real parents for all the adoptions, the source said.
However, the former law firm employee admitted that some of the birth certificates of the babies were forged, the source said.
Chu was charged with selling 38 babies for between $4,000 and $5,000 for adoption in the United States, Australia, Switzerland, Finland, France, Italy and Thailand between November 1979 and last March.
Chu and 41 others, including her husband Lin Wen-chung, were indicted Aug. 19 on charges of 'illegally sending people overseas without their knowing or consent.'
A doctor and three midwives were indicted on charges of issuing forged birth certificates. Also indicted were dozens of phony parents who were accused of falsifying adoption documents.
Most of the 41 defendants pleaded guilty to their respective charges Thursday but denied they knew anything about the 'exports' which they said were handled by Chu, the source said.
Some of the children, most under 3 years old, were believed to have been kidnapped because the defendants could not produce the children's source of origin, the source said.
