Warrant issued for alleged

adoption scammer : Man

supposedly took thousands of
dollars from 62 people
KATHLEEN STINSON, NEWS-PRESS
STAFF WRITER
April 22, 2008 7:19 AM

The Santa Barbara District Attorney's

office has issued an arrest warrant for a Orson Mozes is shown in a
Santa Barbara man who allegedly 1990s photo .
bilked 62 people out of thousands of COURTESY PHOTO
dollars in an adoption scam.

Former School House Road resident

Orson Mozes, 56, is wanted on felony
counts of taking money under false
pretenses and grand theft by use of the
Internet, according to an arrest warrant
filed March 27 in Santa Barbara County
Superior Court.

Alleged victims accuse Mr. Mozes of

promising them the "best" kids -- Joe and Dawn De Lorenzo, of
primarily from Kazakhstan, Ukraine Woodbridge, N.J., were never
and Russia -- through his and his wife able to adopt a child through
Christen Brown's agency, Adoption Adoption International
International Program. Allegations Program. A warrant for the
concern taking victims' money and then arrest of the company's owner ,
not delivering. Orson Mozes, has been issued.
COURTESY PHOTO
"All victims reported they contacted
Mozes after viewing specific available
children whose photos were posted by Mozes/AIP on Internet Web sites,"
according to court documents obtained by the News-Press. "Many victims
state that upon contact with Mozes, they were told they needed to
immediately set up a FedEx account and then send an agency fee,
generally between $7,000 and $11,000, in order to 'hold' the specific
child and remove the child's picture from the Web site, so that it would
not be available to other prospective adoptive parents."

Victims said they were directed to send money via FedEx to Mr. Mozes at
his School House Road address, the declaration states. In return, victims
received a packet of forms and contracts from AIP by e-mail.
According to the District Attorney's office, 66 percent of the victims in the
investigation were not able to adopt any child through Mr. Mozes and
AIP. Another 30 percent were "only able to adopt after several
heartbreaking, expensive and lengthy referrals (of children). This
investigation could only locate (three to four) families from 2004 to 2007
who successfully adopted their first referral and in a timely manner."

"Nearly all the victims who were still in the adoption process with
Mozes/AIP found themselves left with nothing, when Mozes suddenly
'disappeared' in June 2007," the declaration states.

Laura Cleaves,
supervising investigator
for the District
Attorney's Office, who
opened the case in
2005, said she has been
in contact with the FBI
and Interpol to try to
track down Mr. Mozes.

"I'm hopeful we are

going to apprehend him
and I'd like to do it
sooner than later," Ms.
Cleaves said.

The arrest warrant does not name Ms. Brown.

Two alleged victims, Joe and Dawn De Lorenzo, of Woodbridge, N.J., were
never able to adopt a child through Mr. Mozes' adoption agency, despite
giving him more than $75,000 and making three successive attempts to
adopt a child beginning in April 2006, Mrs. De Lorenzo told the News-
Press.

Mr. Mozes "is an emotional rapist," Mrs. De Lorenzo said. "He has taken
more than words can say. He's taken three 'sons' from us," referring to
the infants she and her husband tried to adopt through Adoption
International Program.

Mrs. De Lorenzo said she and her husband gave Mr. Mozes money to
"hold" a child for them until arrangements could be made to travel to the
foreign country to go to court. In December 2006, she said Mr. Mozes
told them suddenly and with no explanation "your son is no longer
available." By that time, she said they had the child's pictures up all over
their house, told family and friends, and had heavily invested their
hopes.

"We were dreaming about the child and had a nursery up," she said.

Mr. Mozes then suggested they "hold" another child -- and wire money to
do so -- which they did.

Court records state that Mr. Mozes provided detailed instructions to

numerous victims on "how to wire money, and in some cases instructed
victims to lie on the forms stating the purpose of the funds being wired."

Mrs. De Lorenzo said she was led to believe the foreign country was
corrupt. She said they also continued to cooperate, in part, because they
had many thousands of dollars invested.

In February 2007, the De Lorenzos flew to Kazakhstan to try to adopt the

second child.

She said someone connected to the adoption agency met them at the
airport to collect the latest installment -- $10,000 in cash. She said the
girl who met them insisted they give her the money in the restroom
where there were no cameras, which they did.

Next, they flew to a city to "bond" with the child, as is required by

Kazakhstan law. Bonding involves meeting with the child for two hours a
day for two weeks at the orphanage. During this time, she said Mr.
Mozes forced them to stay in an apartment at a cost of $175 a day. They
were not allowed to stay in a hotel.

Mrs. De Lorenzo said she thinks the orphanage was in "cahoots" with Mr.
Mozes -- how else could she have gotten the child's pictures?

She said she had been vocal in questioning Mr. Mozes' methods and felt
that he was not happy with her for that reason.

"On the 10th day of bonding, we were brought into the office and told the
baby's mother reappeared," she said. "We had just thrown a birthday for
the child (the day before). I was very public on the blogs and I believe he
purposely told the orphanage director to say that to break my heart."

So ready were the De Lorenzos for a child, they agreed to try a third time.

They went through the bonding process and set up a court date, she
said. The court granted the adoption on the condition they wait 17 days
to allow for objections. During this time, the child's mother objected,
although she had previously abandoned him, according to Mrs. De
Lorenzo.

They went to court three more times to fight the objection, but finally had
to return to the United States to continue their employment.

After returning home, she said they received a letter written in Russian,
which the couple had to pay to have translated.

The letter said the case was closed because they had failed to show up to
court on the appointed day. They had understood someone was handling
the matter there for them.

Mrs. De Lorenzo said she next told Mr. Mozes she was upset and
planned to turn him in to the authorities, whereupon he "skipped town,"
she said. Sometime later, she apparently came across Mr. Mozes on the
Web site Match.com, on which he stated his "turn-on" was power.

"I think he got a kick out of manipulating people's emotions and having
power to control such a large part of their destiny," Mrs. De Lorenzo said.

e-mail: kstinson@newspress.com