Author Erin Siegal McIntyre with Betsy Emanuel, one of the two main characters in “Finding Fernanda,” at the book’s launch party at the Powerhouse Arena in New York City.
Erin Siegal McIntyre is an American photographer and writer. She is a Senior Fellow at the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism, a Soros Justice Fellow, and a Redux Pictures photographer. She was a 2008-2009 fellow at the Toni Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. Erin is the author of the award-winning book Finding Fernanda, (Beacon Press 2012), which examines organized crime and child trafficking in international adoption between Guatemala and the U.S.
Previously, Erin wrote a column on public records and government accountability for the Columbia Journalism Review, “The FOIA Watchdog.” She’s contributed to various media outlets, including Univision, the New York Times, Time,Reuters, Newsweek, O Magazine, Businessweek, Rolling Stone, and more.
She currently lives and works in Tijuana, Mexico as a foreign correspondent. When she’s not eating tacos or working, Erin can be found along the border at Rancho Los Amigos, riding horses and smoking cigars with her favorite vaqueros.
Select interviews in English:
“Central American Horror Story,” Racialicious
“For Sale, Baby,” Guernica Magazine
“In The Land of Lost Children,” Human Goods
“Finding Fernanda: Pictures from an Investigation,” The New Yorker
“Fernanda’s story: The dark side of the Guatemalan baby trade,” Reuters TrustLaw
“The Horrors of International Adoption in Finding Fernanda,” Kirkus Reviews
“Freeing the information: From a high school teacher to the Bay Citizen: this year’s heroes in journalism,” San Francisco Bay Guardian Online
“International Adoption or Child Trafficking?” The American Prospect
“Journalist Traces Corruption in International Adoption,” Adoption Today Magazine
“Child Abduction for Adoption and the Tangled Web of Deceit in Guatemala: A Review of Erin Siegal’s ‘Finding Fernanda,’” RH Reality Check
“Gruesome Tijuana, Mexico find underscores need to humanize stories, border reporter says,” Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas
In Spanish:
“Finding Fernanda, libro sobre tráfico infantil,” El Economista
“Erin Siegal: Periodismo En La Frontera,” Revista Cuello Blanco
BOOKS
“Finding Fernanda: Two Mothers, One Child, and a Cross-Border Search for Truth,” Beacon Press, May 8, 2012; Cathexis Press, 2011. McIntyre’s first full-length nonfiction book reported on her investigation into one case of child kidnapping for international adoption—and through that story details some of the criminal networks and corruption that afflicted some U.S. adoptions from Guatemala.
“The U.S. Embassy Cables: Adoption Fraud in Guatemala, 1987-2010″(Cathexis Press, February 1, 2012) is McIntyre’s second book about international adoption in Guatemala. During her research, McIntyre combed through 2,000 pages of records and cables that due to delays in the State Department’s response to her 30 FOIA requests (filed between 2008 and 2010) were not given to her until after “Finding Fernanda” was written. McIntyre published these raw-source documents in a 718-page volume to make this valuable information available to journalists, policymakers, adoptive families, and adoption advocates.
