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And so it dragged on. In March the state appeals court threw out Judge Ager's ruling, saying Michigan had no right to ignore the Iowa rulings. On July 1, the state's highest court confirmed, 6 to 1, that Michigan had no jurisdiction in the case and that Jessica would have to be returned to the Schmidts in a month.
WHO'S THE VILLAIN?
A story that holds so much pain for so many people needs a villain. Each set of parents has found grounds to blame the other, and as the stakes rose and the story went public, the charges got uglier. DeBoer supporters claim it was Cara's lie about the father in the first place that started the trouble. But the Schmidts' advocates retort that at the time she gave up her baby, Cara was in a fragile state, without the help of psychological counseling or legal advice. And the courts could not punish Dan for Cara's deception; he never consented to the adoption in the first place.
Others critical of the DeBoers note that the couple knew early on that the adoption was in jeopardy -- and by continuing to fight while keeping custody of Jessica, says psychotherapist Annette Baran, who specializes in adoption issues, "they've managed to pervert the whole issue of best interests of the child. It's time that people realized that adoption is for children, not infertile adults." Jan DeBoer recoils at such charges. "The Schmidts accuse us of delaying the proceedings to help ourselves," he says. "But I want Jessi to know the truth -- that we only appealed for her own protection."
The one target everyone can hate with equal passion is the legal system that placed two families and a child on the rack for 2 1/2 years. Even if the DeBoers, having fallen in love with the baby, could not give up without a fight, their legal help could have advised differently. The DeBoers should have relinquished Jessica immediately, argues Beverly Hills lawyer David Leavitt, one of the country's pre-eminent adoption lawyers: "Any good adoption lawyer understands that if a birth mother changes her mind within a few weeks, and you resist, you're in for terrible grief."
Suellyn Scarnecchia of the University of Michigan law school took on the DeBoer case through the school's legal clinic, and defends her strategy to fight on. "People don't really understand the psychology of waiting and waiting for a child and bringing one home," she argues. "It is ridiculous to say, 'When you have a problem, give her up.' "
But some legal scholars argue that the DeBoers never really had a case. Federal law prevented Michigan courts from interfering with a custody proceeding under way in another state. As for Iowa, more than 20 years ago, the state supreme court raised eyebrows nationwide when it ruled that a churchgoing set of grandparents would provide a better life for a young child than the child's father, who was living as a bohemian in California. States everywhere reacted by writing laws to clarify paternal rights -- and Iowa wrote one declaring that biological parents have custodial rights unless a child has been abandoned. Only then are "the best interests of the child" considered. That meant that Daniel Schmidt, who never abandoned Jessica, had custodial rights, period. The Schmidts couldn't lose in Iowa, and when the DeBoers took the case to Michigan, they couldn't win.