Ksenia Antonova
Victim of Attachment Therapy/Parenting
Cherokee County, Georgia, USA
Age 17, Sent to Attachment Therapy/Parenting
Note: The following account has been prepared from press reports, personal interviews, trial transcripts, and other public records.
In 2011, Russian adoptee Ksenia Antonova, 17, was sent by the State of Georgia to the infamous Ranch for Kids in remote Montana after her American father Michael Gizmor (aka Michael Grismore in some press stories) repeatedly raped and beat her. This adoption arrangement, Ksenia’s second by Americans, was legally dissolved.
Russia’s Ombudsman for Children’s Rights, Pavel Astakhov, referred to Ranch for Kids as a “reservation” for Russian children abandoned by their adoptive parents. Ranch for Kids, owned by Joyce Sterkel, had 34 abandoned Russian teens in 2010 when a Russian counsel visit the facility where Ksenia will stay until she is 21 years old.
Presumably Ranch for Kids is an approved provider by the State of Georgia. The Ranch for Kids website lists four resources for “Reactive Attachment Disorder” (a diagnosis the Ranch claims to specialize in handling): it links to the websites of Nancy Thomas, Ronald Federici, and Nancy Geoghegan (a long-time proponent of Attachment Therapy/Parenting), and a Wikipedia article.
Depending on the terms in a new Russian-USA adoption treaty, Russia could push to bring Ksenia back to the country of her birth.
Webography
- “Raped Russian orphan to be isolated at children’s rancho in USA,” Pravda, 20 June 2011.
- “Special needs 15-year-old Russian adoptee disrupted, raped by new adoptive father,” REFORM, 10 June 2011.
- “U.S., Kremlin reach deal to monitor adoptions,” by Richard Boudreaux, The Wall Street Journal, 12 July 2011.
- “From Russia with love–dealing with difficult adoptions,” by Juju Chang, Jim Dubreuil, Keturah Gray, ABC 20/20, 28 Nov 2008.