Question about illegal adoption that may have occured.......?

Question

I will try my best to explain this.... (all fake names)
My mother was raised by her grandmother(jane), her mother (sue) gave her up when she was 1. Well my mother (sarah Jones) just found out when applying for a passport, that when her SSI number is run, it comes up as sarah Norris, not sarah jones. After doing some investigation, it turns out that sue had married another man when sarah was 11. Shortly after, some kind of illegal adoption was done, making sarah jones, a sarah norris, in order for sue to get army benefits for sarah, who was now listed as a daughter of her new husband.(sarah was still never living with sue nor ever saw her in 10 years) Sarah and Jane never knew this happened. Sarah went through her life til now, 40 years later, living as a now widowed Sarah Hanson, who lives off of disability and widowers pay from my dad. Question is, is does all of sarah's accomplishments and marriages void out, since she used sarah jones to get them all and on her marriage lisence?

no they never sent her money EVER. My mother has not talked to her real mother except for many one time her entire 40 years. She wants nothing to do with her, and now REALLY wants nothing to do with her because my mom grew up very poor with her grandmother, while her real mother was getting a good bit of money from the army and never sending them any of it. since it was supposed to be used for my mom growing up.

Answer 1

Not necessarily.

The issue which could be brought up for the marriage would be fraud -- a marriage is voidable (meaning that it can be nullified) if fraud was present at the time of the marriage -- but, for fraud to exist, one party has to have pertinent information, and withhold it, knowingly, from the other party.

If you mother knew that her name was Sarah Norris instead of Sarah Jones, and used Sarah Jones anyway, then your father (or his estate) could sue for a nullification of the marriage.

Beyond that, it really isn't much of an issue.

If her "Legal" name is Sarah Norris, and you live in a common law state, she may well have actually completed the requirements for a common law name change. . . if that's not the case, an attorney could very easily help her file in the probate court for a name change so that she could legally be Sarah Jones instead of Norris . . .

If she's concerned about the adoption, I'd say . . . go to whatever court issued the adoption decree -- and get a copy, then take it to an attorney and explain the situation -- s/he'll be of great assistance.

Answer 2

It really isn't a big deal. Sarah needs to go see an attorney & have the attorney correct the name on all of her important documents, such as bank accounts, IDs, Social Security, etc. It really isn't a big deal & is a VERY common problem.

Answer 3

and they did never send her money? or what? i mean to your mother.