With Mother in Prison, Dispute Arises Over Hand That Rocks the Cradle : Child Care: A Florida ministry set up foster care for pregnant inmates. Now they are accused of promising adoptions and working outside the law.

LOWELL, Fla. — Linda Orsini was five months pregnant and in prison. She knew she couldn’t keep a baby there, but with the help of a volunteer prison ministry, she found a couple to be her child’s foster parents.

That couple, Jeff and Rhonda Lewis, exchanged letters with her, visited her at the Florida Correctional Institution here and accepted her regular collect calls.

David Orsini was born in May, 1994, and the Lewises began caring for him two days later. After nearly a year, they wanted to adopt him.

Now Orsini and the Lewises are preparing for a custody fight. And three state agencies are investigating how the prison ministry arranged foster care for Orsini and dozens of other babies born to inmates at Lowell.

The Lewises say the conservative ministry they contacted about becoming foster parents, Concerned Citizens of Florida, told them adoption sometimes becomes possible in such cases.

They say they knew David would be in their care only temporarily, but after rearing and nurturing him for a year they can’t bear to give him up.

Orsini, 38, who has a record of arrests for drugs, burglary and car theft, says she never intended to give David up for adoption and only wanted temporary care until she’s released Aug. 1.

“I feel like the Lewises are stealing David from me,” Orsini said. “I know my history is bad. I’ve got 23 years of . . . addiction behind me. But I’ve got a life ahead of me. I love David with all my heart. He’s given me my strength, my sobriety and a whole new life.”

The ministry’s top official denies any wrongdoing. But investigators are trying to determine if the group’s prison ministry, Temporary Christian Volunteers, was illegally operating as an adoption agency and misled foster parents into thinking they could adopt.

Investigators have temporarily suspended the group’s prison activities. They say they believe as many as 70 newborns, including Orsini’s son, were placed in foster homes through Concerned Citizens.

Social workers for the state Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services have tracked 38 of these infants so far and taken custody of seven, some from foster homes cited previously for child abuse.

So far, however, the dispute between Orsini and the Lewises is the only custody battle that has surfaced.

Linda Rozar, head of Concerned Citizens, said she knew of three cases in which foster parents eventually adopted prison-born babies.

“All were through the mother, the family and their attorney,” she said. “The decisions were made by the inmate, the families and their pastors.”

The health department, the state Department of Corrections and the state attorney general’s office are investigating whether the group illegally placed inmates’ babies in unregistered or unlicensed foster homes.

In Florida, any mother can arrange to place her child temporarily in foster care, said Michelle Lagos, a health department spokeswoman.

A mother may ask the department for help if she has no one to care for her child. She also can work through a lawyer to arrange a private adoption or through a religious organization under the umbrella of the Florida Assn. of Christian Child Caring Agencies.

Prison mothers don’t automatically forfeit their parental rights, said Kim Tucker, the health department’s general counsel.

The Lowell prison, which houses more than 700 women, is expected to notify the health department when an inmate mother says she has no one to care for her baby. Assistant Lowell Supt. Jeff Shealy said 40 to 70 babies are born to prisoners annually at the state’s only women’s prison.

The Lewises, married four years, have a 13-year-old daughter from Mrs. Lewis’ previous marriage but have been unable to have a child of their own. They also are trying to adopt an infant girl they took in as foster parents through Concerned Citizens.

They maintain they would be better parents for David than Orsini. They say she all but ignored her two other children, now 21 and 12.

Orsini admits she was a bad parent earlier but insists she’ll do better with David.

“I think I deserve the chance to prove myself and raise my son,” she said. “I haven’t been a good mother in the past, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be.”