Nun sues alleged ‘stolen baby’

MARIA ASCENSION LOPEZ was summonsed by an Almeria judge earlier this week on defamation charges.

A lawsuit was brought against Lopez by a nun who is also her adoptive father’s niece. Lopez insists that she was taken at birth from her mother and the nun, who signed the adoption papers, and pushed it through when the couple were in their 60’s.

Now 51, Lopez discovered when she was eight that she was adopted and ‘bought’ for 250,000 pesetas – €1,500 in today’s money and a considerable amount in 1964.

The nun started legal proceedings after her name appeared in print as a result of investigations into Spain’s ‘stolen babies’ by Argentinian judge Maria Servini.

Newborns were allegedly taken at birth from mothers who were either unmarried or women with large families but scant education, who were unlikely to question hospital staff.