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International News Title: Baptist Laura Silsby who set off to 'rescue' orphans left behind debts and bad wages The leader of the American missionaries imprisoned for alleged child abduction in Haiti has a history of divorce, bad debts, and unpaid wages back home. Laura Silsby, 40, founded her New Life Children’s Refuge charity at an address in a still-unfinished development in a suburb of Boise, Idaho, in November. A month later the $358,500 (£230,000) house was repossessed by the mortgage holder, MetLife Home Loans. Ms Silsby, a divorced mother of young children, organised the Christian “rescue mission” that led to the arrest of the ten American Baptists for trying to take 33 Haitian children out of the country. Back home she runs a personal shopping service on the internet that earned her the eWomanNetwork’s International Businesswoman of the Year award in 2006. Court records show, however, that she has repeatedly been sued for unpaid wages and bad debts — and has had at least nine driving violations since 1997. According to the newspaper the Idaho Statesman 14 claims totalling $38,100, including two by the same employee, were filed against the PersonalShopper.com company over the past two years. The Idaho department of labour found that $30,620 was owed to employees and also imposed a $4,000 fine. The company’s former marketing director went to court against Ms Silsby and PersonalShopper.com in October claiming five months of unpaid wages, totalling $22,016. “In multiple e-mails during 2009, Ms Silsby repeatedly told the plaintiff that she had investors ‘committed,’ that the money was being ‘wired’ and that investors were going to be providing funds,” the suit says. Ms Silsby, who is currently in a cell in Haiti, is due in court in Idaho for a civil jury trial on February 22. She is also due to appear in court in March to answer a second civil suit brought against her by an Idaho law firm, Beer & Cain, for $4,526 in unpaid fees. Other cases include a claim last year by a company called Disaster Kleenup seeking $3,225.79 and a 2008 action by a debt collection agency for $731.33 for money claimed by the fire brigade. Default judgments were also entered against her last year by a car finance company suing for the return of a 2008 Yamaha all-terrain vehicle valued at $2,740 and a tyre company claiming $1,058. Ms Silsby reportedly became interested in Haiti after her father did missionary dental work in the country. She founded her charity with her live-in nanny, Charisa Coulter, 24, who is a member of her church and is also under arrest in Haiti. The New Life Children’s Refuge had been planning to build an orphanage in the neighbouring Dominican Republic but Ms Silsby, who had just returned from a trip to Haiti, swang into action the moment the earthquake hit. Recruiting other southern Baptists she began a two-week “rescue mission” planning to pick up Haitian orphans from the streets. A planning document, which was posted on a church website, said that the group hoped to save children “abandoned on the streets, makeshift hospitals or from collapsed orphanages” and take them to a refuge set up in a rented 45-room hotel in the Dominican resort of Cabarete, with room for up to 150 children. The mission appealed for tax-deductible donations of medical supplies, nappies, hildren’s clothing, stuffed animals and toys and 90 beds. “We will strive to also equip each child with a solid education and vocational skills as well as opportunities for adoption into a loving Christian family,” the planning document said.
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#1. To: 3-Dee (#0)
Hey, who doesn't?!! (lots of laughing out loud)
lol
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