An Arkansas judge said today that twin girls adopted twice through an Internet agency belonged to neither a California nor a British couple claiming them, and that the international custody case should be decided by a Missouri court.
Pulaski County Chancery Judge Mackie Pierce asked that the girls, now under foster care in Britain, be sent back to the United States.
Alan and Judith Kilshaw of Wales and Richard and Vickie Allen of California both claimed custody of the children, but the Kilshaws had not met Arkansas residency requirements and the Allens had not had the children long enough for a legal claim, Pierce said.
The girls, born in St Louis, on June 26, 2000, to Tranda and Aaron Wecker, were put up for adoption through an Internet agency after the couple separated. They babies adopted first by the Allens, then two months later taken by Tranda Wecker and the Kilshaws to Arkansas where the Kilshaws adopted them under the state's lenient adoption laws.
Both biological parents, who remain apart, have filed separate legal petitions in Missouri seeking custody of the twins.