Preying on Hope: Part I

Cheat!

Sony Music

True Crime, Tv & Film, Society & Culture

4.8 • 1.7K Ratings

🗓️ 22 March 2022

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

For families seeking to adopt, Tara Lee’s Always Hope Pregnancy and Education Center was an ideal option. Not only did Tara organize matches between prospective families and birth mothers quickly, but she also prioritized providing emotional and financial support for the birth moms. Sure, Tara was a bit disorganized. And hard to track down. But she was busy organizing adoptions and tending to her own family. Or so everyone thought. That would change when a number of Tara's clients connected online. And then, they discovered that Tara was not at all who she seemed. A Somethin’ Else Production. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	It's a Tuesday night in early October of 2018.
0:11.6	Theresa and Mike Muthini are in Port Huron, Michigan, heading to a steakhouse.
0:16.3	They've come all the way from their home in Atlanta, Georgia.
0:19.4	They're nervous, excited, overwhelmed.
0:23.6	Because for the first time, they're meeting in person the birth parents of the child
0:28.6	they're hoping to adopt.
0:31.9	Being matched with expecting parents hundreds of miles away meant that all communication
0:36.2	up to this point was over text and phone.
0:39.4	Now here was their opportunity to see each other, face to face before the birth.
0:45.2	It all felt like a dream, like they had made it all up.
0:48.7	We met our birth parents, they were real, she was pregnant.
0:52.7	The woman who was pregnant, she doesn't want to be named for this story.
0:56.4	There was also someone else at this dinner with the Muthini's and the birth mother.
1:01.0	And that person is Tara Lee.
1:03.8	Tara Lee ran always hope pregnancy and education center, where she matched families hoping
1:08.6	to adopt like the Muthini's with pregnant women who were making an adoption plan.
1:14.2	And this steak dinner would be the first time the Muthini's met Tara in person as well.
1:19.0	So here they were, the Muthini's, the birth mother and Tara Lee.
1:24.2	I remember it like it was yesterday, she had on a Rolex, she had on like Prada reading glasses,
1:28.9	a Louis lemon sweatsuit and like probably a $3,000 Louis bag, maybe more.
1:34.0	And just like the nails, the fake eyelashes, this whole look of like, I don't even know how to explain it.
1:42.7	The Muthini's were confused and pretty put off by Tara's whole look.
	...

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