Thread: TN-Mexico interested in Nashville child custody case

Mexico interested in Nashville child custody case
May 14, 2009

Read Comments(15)

The Mexican government has hired a lawyer to monitor a Nashville child-custody battle involving a severely brain-damaged girl.



Alessandra Villalobos, 4, is also at the center of a medical malpractice lawsuit that is seeking millions of dollars for her care.

The girl's mother, Ingrid Diaz, is a Mexican national from San Pedro Pochutla, a city on the southwest coast of Mexico in the state of Oaxaca. Diaz is in the country illegally, but her daughter is an American citizen who was born in Nashville.

Diaz is trying to regain custody of her daughter from a local nurse.

News coverage of the custody battle prompted the Mexican consul in Atlanta to ask Nashville immigration lawyer Elliott Ozment to investigate.

"They have asked me to initiate contact with this woman to make sure her needs are being met and she's being adequately represented," Ozment said.

Custody of the child has gone back and forth in the last year between Diaz and the nurse, Amanda Stinnett, 50, of Nashville. The nurse first got custody of Alessandra when her mother was arrested on a drug charge. Diaz regained custody of her child after the charge was dismissed.

Davidson County Probate Court Judge Randy Kennedy ordered the child removed from Diaz in March and back into Stinnett's custody, ruling that the mother's financial problems were endangering the girl.

Diaz faced eviction from her Nashville apartment and having her electricity — vital for Alessandra's medical equipment — cut off. She is tube-fed and needs round-the-clock care.

Lawyers say her condition is the result of a medical mishap when she was 3 that forever altered her life.

Diaz is suing Vanderbilt University Medical Center, claiming that a doctor punctured one of her daughter's arteries and caused massive internal bleeding, shock and brain damage. The hospital maintains that severe complications from a serious illness, not malpractice, are to blame.

Immigration officials have allowed Diaz to remain in the country because of the pending custody and malpractice cases. Her lawyers are trying to get permission for Diaz to legally work while the court battles drag on.

A custody hearing is set for July 16. The case is in probate court to protect any money that may come in from the lawsuit.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20090 ... 1/-1/RSS05

It's all about the money. Amazing how a poor illegal alien can get treatment at Vanderbilt. Good luck, if you are a citizen and don't have insurance or cash. You get to go to the "indigent" hospital of Metro General.

I suspect Mexico is involved because of the potential of a HUGE cash settlement.

If there is a settlement, the mother should get zero. The girl would be better off with the nurse and the mother deported with no custody and no money.