MOSCOW, Dec. 2 (UPI) -- A Russian official expressed disappointment at the acquittal of an American accused in the death of his adopted Russian son.
"Horrible news came from the United States. Another Russian child died at the hands of his foster father," said Pavel Astakhov, children's rights commissioner of Russia.
The child, Isaac Dykstra, died Aug. 14, 2005, and the father, Brian Dykstra, was acquitted last month in Iowa, but Russian officials didn't learn of the case until after the jury handed out its not guilty verdict, ITAR-Tass reported Friday.
Astakhov said the boy died three months after he was adopted in Krasnoyarsk and criticized U.S. officials for not notifying Russian officials in a timely manner.
"His foster father was accused of the boy's murder, but he was bailed out for 15,000 dollars and did not spend in custody so much as a day. He claimed he was not guilty and hinted all the time at some disease from which the boy suffered and which eventually brought about his death," he reported.
Russia's Investigation Committee said Friday it would launch its own case into the boy's cause of death, RIA Novosti reported.
"The circumstances of the boy's death, [who was] adopted by U.S. parents in the Krasnoyarsk region in 2005, will come under scrutiny," the committee said in a release.
Since 1991, a total of 19 Russian children adopted worldwide have died at the hands of their adoptive parents, Russian statistics show.
"We demand that the U.S. authorities take urgently the adequate measures for the protection of Russian children, who were adopted by American nationals and who now live in the United States. Their total number is some 60,000," Astakhov said.
