Ohio father, Indiana couple fighting over child

Associated Press

SELLERSBURG, Ind.

An Indiana couple is holding on to the son they’ve tried to adopt for nearly three years even though a court has ordered them to surrender the child to his biological father in Ohio.

The Lucas County Juvenile Court this week ordered Jason and Christy Vaughn to hand over the nearly 3-year-old boy, Grayson, to Benjamin Wyrembek, prompting their attorney to file a flurry of legal maneuvers to prevent the surrender.

Wyrembek’s attorney, meanwhile, says courts have ruled in his client’s favor, and the case shouldn’t be tried in the media.

According to court filings, Wyrembek was seeing a married Toledo, Ohio, woman in 2007 when she became pregnant. She broke off the relationship and divorced her husband, ultimately surrendering the child at birth to a Columbus-based adoption agency.

The Vaughns arranged to adopt the child and were present for the birth. Nine days later, the Vaughns brought him home to Sellersburg in southern Indiana. Christy Vaughn was pregnant at the time with the couple’s second child, Addison, who was born five months later.

But within 30 days of Grayson’s birth, Wyrembek, of Swanton, Ohio, signed up with a state registry in Ohio saying that he could be the boy’s father and then objected to the adoption. That led to the court battle, with Ohio courts ruling in Wyrembek’s favor.