Baby Tamia reunited with mother in Chicago

CHICAGO — Baby Tamia — the child at the center of an interstate custody battle — was reunited here Thursday night with her mother who gave her up for adoption in Utah.

"It's the best moment in my life," said 20-year-old Carmen McDonald after the family reunion at O'Hare International Airport.

Illinois Department of Children and Family Services officials went to Salt Lake City earlier in the day to pick up 6-month-old Tamia.

A custody battle over Tamia persisted until this week when an adoption agency in suburban Salt Lake City declined to place the girl with prospective parents in Utah after they were arrested on drug possession charges.

Tamia's mother and grandmother, Maria McDonald, sued the adoption agency in January to get Tamia back, claiming the agency pressured Carmen McDonald into giving up the child.

Cook County (Ill.) Judge Michael J. Murphy ordered Wednesday that Tamia be turned over to Illinois officials who would place her in the Chicago home that Carmen McDonald shares with her mother.

The Utah juvenile court system earlier on Thursday approved releasing the baby to the Illinois child services officials.

"She looks good, she looks healthy," said Maria McDonald, Tamia's grandmother. "She looks like she was taken care of."

Carmen McDonald signed away her parental rights in a Salt Lake motel in December after working with A Cherished Child adoption agency.

"She was stressed when she arrived in Utah. She tried to change her mind," said Larry Darnell Trotter, a bishop from the headquarters of the United Pentecostal Churches of Christ in Evergreen Park., Ill., who flew to Utah Thursday for the transfer of the baby. He said he would be the child's godfather when the baby was christened, or dedicated, on Easter Sunday.

Trotter said McDonald, who moved in with her mother three weeks ago, wants to go back to school.

"We're very excited to bring Baby Tamia back. We've been waiting for this day," Trotter said. "We feel justice has been done."

Murphy said he didn't consider the arrest of the Utah couple when he ordered Tamia returned. The judge ruled last week that the adoption agency violated an interstate law on adoptions.