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Macomb County Woman Pleads Guilty In Adoption Scheme

NEW HAVEN, Mich. (CBS DETROIT/ AP) — A Macomb County woman is facing eight or more years in prison after pleading guilty to fraud.

Tara Lee of New Haven schemed to collect money from couples who wanted to adopt children.

Lee admitted collecting at least $250,000 since 2014 in her plea agreement Tuesday.

Federal prosecutors say Lee wasn't licensed to arrange adoptions and at times matched more than one set of adoptive parents to a birth mother. She also matched couples to birth mothers who didn't exist.

In 2018, Lee told a client that a birth mother named RaShaunda had been shot and killed and the baby had died. But RaShaunda didn't exist.

She returns to Detroit federal court Nov. 19.

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