Seven siblings ‘sold by parents at birth’ find each other through DNA

Adopted daughter’s search for her biological roots traced seven full siblings, and an even deeper secret.

Reissa Spier received a commerical DNA test for her 62nd brthday. It was the start of a DNA puzzle unravelling.

An adopted daughter’s search for her biological roots using DNA websites has traced seven full siblings, five of whom were also brought up by adoptive parents scattered across Canada and America.

Reissa Spier’s inquiries also exposed a deeper secret — she and the other adopted children were probably sold to people desperate to become parents at a time of lax laws governing the trade of babies.

Spier, 67, who lives near Vancouver, also found that she had three more half-siblings from her birth mother and another eight from her biological father. Spier’s journey of self-discovery began five years ago and exposed secret after secret, including the falsified birth records of all six siblings put up for adoption. “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said to people, ‘DNA doesn’t lie. People lie’,” Spier told The Washington Post.

She knew from a young age that she was adopted by her Jewish parents but did not think of tracing her biological family until she was diagnosed with breast cancer aged 51. She wanted to know if she had mutations in the BRCA genes, often carried by Ashkenazi Jewish women, and could have passed them on to her daughter. But she was denied official screening because she was adopted.

“I had to prove that I had a first-degree relative who also had breast cancer, and I didn’t know any first-degree relatives,” she said.

It was only when she received a commercial DNA test for her 62nd birthday that Spier was able to find out she did not carry the mutations and also learnt that she had a full sister, called Rene Holm, living in Rutland, Massachusetts.

Spier said: “This couple was together, had a baby girl, and gave her up for adoption. And two and a half years later they’re still together and gave up Rene. We both thought this was really sketchy. Why would they have done this?”

DNA research with a different website connected them to Bob Bryntwick, 73, living near Toronto, who told them about his upbringing in Montreal with four siblings but also how his mother gave birth every year between 1949 and 1957. Whenever a baby disappeared, the family seemed to have more money.

“I was young, and I didn’t understand,” Bryntwick said. He said that his older brother told him their siblings were sold for $AU11,000 each.

The Times