When Jessica and Adam Davis adopted a little girl named Namata from Uganda, they thought that their family was complete. However, they were unaware that a terrible truth would jeopardize everything.

When Jessica and Adam Davis adopted a little girl from Uganda, they were over the moon. Not only had they added to their brood, but they believed that they had also provided a child with a better future. However, they were yet to learn the full circumstances of their adopted daughter’s past.

Jessica is a successful photographer from St. Clairsville, Ohio, and she and her associate pastor husband Adam are the biological parents of four kids. However, in 2013 the couple decided to grow their family further by adopting a child.

But the Davises wanted the path they chose to be a moral one. For them, adopting was not about simply adding another child to their family; instead, they wanted to share their love and wealth with someone who might not otherwise experience prosperity.

As a result, Jessica began researching various adoption options. That’s when she discovered that three million children in Uganda were in need of loving parents. So, she and Adam decided on an international adoption.

Indeed, the couple were confident that they could provide a Ugandan orphan with a better life. And the pair subsequently began filling out paperwork and completing checks, handing over thousands of dollars in the process. Then, after a year of waiting, Jessica and Adam were finally given the green light to go ahead and adopt.

Soon after, a seemingly perfect candidate came along, and in 2015 the Davises completed their adoption. The child was a six-year-old girl named Namata. And when describing the new arrival to CNN in 2017, Jessica said that the child was “beautiful, strong and brave.”

And the girl’s story likely moved Jessica and Adam. “We were told her father was deceased, that she was being severely neglected at home and her mother was leaving her open to abuse, leaving her for days,” Jessica revealed to CNN. “It was a pretty dramatic file.”

Namata would move to America, however, and her English vastly improved after just a matter of months in the country. One of the little girl’s favorite talking points was her birth mother. She would tell her adoptive parents how close they were, spending time in the kitchen together and accompanying each other to church.

The Davises felt, though, that Namata’s memories of home were at odds with the picture their agency, European Adoption Consultants, had painted. And as a consequence, alarm bells started ringing for the family. Therefore, they launched an investigation into the claims made against Namata’s mother.

According to CNN, the youngster’s mom was described on a referral form as “helpless.” Furthermore, the document said that the Ugandan woman couldn’t “provide basic needs of the child for better growth.” But as the Davises later discovered, that wasn’t really the case.

Eventually, then, Jessica and Adam uncovered the murky circumstances behind Namata’s adoption: it appeared that someone had tricked the girl’s mother into giving her up. According to CNN, the parent had believed that her daughter was being sent away for educational purposes and that the child would return to her at some point.

It had all begun when an alleged trafficker turned up at Namata’s local church, Jessica told CNN. On the basis of his schooling claims, he had recruited seven children – Namata included – and transported them to an organization called God’s Mercy. It was there that the Davises had first met the girl they would adopt.

When Namata’s mother agreed to send her away, she had been mourning the loss of her husband. And the opportunity to provide her daughter with a better education was too good to turn down. However, CNN revealed that the woman later told a Ugandan court that she was unaware that she had forsaken her parental rights.

And after learning of Namata’s background, the Davises were horrified. They also arranged a Skype call with their adopted daughter’s mom. It was then that Namata – by now aged seven – learned that her mother had apparently never meant to give her up.

Witnessing the little girl’s anguish following the revelation, Jessica and Adam felt that there was only one thing they could do. So, with the help of the U.S. Department of State, they had Namata’s adoption voided. After all, she’d never been an orphan in the first place.

After completing the relevant documentation, the Davises duly handed back parental rights to Namata’s mother. Then, after throwing the little girl a farewell celebration, the family returned the child they had loved as their own for a year back to her rightful home in Uganda.

But following their harrowing adoption experience, Jessica and Adam were emotionally drained – not to mention $65,000 out of pocket. As Namata’s former adoptive father lamented to CNN, “The only trauma this poor kid ever experienced was because we essentially placed an order for a child.”

Since Namata’s relocation, the U.S. Department of State has debarred European Adoption Consultants for three years. The December 2016 decision was upheld a year later, despite an appeal. Meanwhile, the Ugandan government told CNN that it had closed down the God’s Mercy orphanage, where the Davises had first met Namata.

And with their ordeal behind them, the Davises and Namata tried hard to get their lives back on track. They also shared regular calls between Ohio and Uganda, where the young girl’s mother told CNN that she was “very, very, very happy” to have Namata back.

However, having their one-time daughter grow up without them is difficult for her former adoptive parents – particularly when they receive photos of Namata. “I tend to get teary-eyed because of how much I miss her. I would love to wrap my arms around her, but then I remind myself of all that she almost lost,” Jessica told CNN.