The Missouri Court of Appeals has upheld the adoption of a Guatemalan child by a southwest Missouri couple.
The court on Monday upheld a lower court decision to terminate the parental rights of the boy’s biological mother, Encarnancion Romero, and authorize the adoption by a Carthage couple.
Seth and Melinda Moser had raised the now 6-year-old boy since he was a year old.
Romero had challenged a July 2012 decision that found she had forfeited her rights because she had abandoned and neglected the child. The boy was 11 months old when Romero was arrested in May 2007 in an immigration raid at a Barry County poultry processing plant.
Romero’s attorneys have not decided whether they will appeal the ruling to the Missouri Supreme Court.