Dark Future

How our angelic adoptive daughter turned into Little Miss Evil

Friends, family and teachers were blinded by Alex’s manipulative behaviour, blaming everything on her “learning difficulties”.

At school she was the model student – bumbling but eager.

The exception was Alex’s drama teacher, who herself had an adopted child.

She’d seen through her manipulative behaviour.

“Alex is not the self-effacing little thing she appears,” she said ominously.

“It’s the staring that first made me suspect. My son did the same when he was angry.

“I also think she’s overplaying the helplessness. These kids are very good at playing innocent.”

I wanted to hug the drama teacher with relief.

Study: 1 in 50 U.S. babies abused, neglected annually

ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) — About 1 in 50 U.S. infants are victims of nonfatal child abuse or neglect in a year, according to the first national study of the problem in that age group.

Other studies have looked at child abuse and neglect, but this is believed to be the first to focus on infants.

The study focused on children younger than 1 year, and found nearly a third were one week old or younger when the abuse or neglect occurred.

“It is a particularly vulnerable group,” said study co-author Rebecca Leeb, of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“We were struck by the fact there was a clustering of maltreatment with the very, very early age group.”

The researchers counted more than 91,000 infant victims of abuse and neglect in the period October 1, 2005 to September 30, 2006.

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