updateKRO-NCRV is investigating sixteen cases from the program without atrace involving a Colombian fixer whose integrity is in question overtonight’s episode of Scammers Tackled by crime journalist Kees van der Spek.The broadcaster can now confirm two ‘mismatches’ of Dutch people who are notlinked to the correct biological parents in Colombia.
Two other matches have since been confirmed by DNA testing. “We will againexamine the other twelve cases and, if desired and possible, offer thoseinvolved a DNA test. We have been doing a DNA test as standard in all oursearches since 2019,” KRO-NCRV said in a statement last night.
Kees van der Spek gave a talk show yesterday Jinek that in any case three,but possibly even five people have been linked to wrong biological parents viathe program. __ The journalist doesn’t really think it’s a good idea tocriticize another program that does a good job. ,,You have to assume that_without a trace_ simply acting in good faith. They want to do good things andreunite people and then you discover this. I came into contact with Barbara,who started a search agency herself and discovered that a number of thingswere not right. It is something so essential for adoptees: what is youridentity? And if that is not true, you have to dive into it as a journalist.”
Biological mother
Barbara Quee participated in 2005 Without a trace. It stated that herbiological mother had been found. The woman said she had gotten into troubleand asked not to contact her again. ,,I immediately started to doubt it abit,” said Quee at Jinek. “I also immediately say: what a different story.Very crazy that without a trace your mother has found, but she has no fixedabode. And you can’t meet her.”
Barbara and Kristian. © RTL/Jinek
There were also no pictures of her mother. ,,I have been in contact with_without trace,_ because that is something tangible. What I was looking for.”It was then stated that no photos had been taken because her mother would havebeen too scared. In 2018, a friend expressed her doubts about Barbara. She sawcertain details that weren’t right and that didn’t match the adoption papers.
She also had contact with a boy who was to be reunited with his sister, butthat turned out not to be his sister at all. That was confirmed by a DNA test.That wasn’t through without a trace , but through another organization. Thefixer, the man who arranges everything on the spot, turned out to be the sameman in his search as in Barbara’s: Edwin Vela.
Fixers
,,That is someone who does the research off-screen,’ said Van der Spek.“That’s how many programs work abroad, they use fixers to figure things out.He is someone you can trust blindly. But he turned out to be someone youshouldn’t rely on.” The crime journalist indicated that Vela was involved insixteen cases of without a trace has cooperated.
Kristian van der Mark was linked to his half-brother through the program. Hewas also told that his mother had no permanent residence. He wanted to dosomething good for his half brother and paid his school fees. ,,Everythingwent well through Edwin Vela. If I wanted to keep in touch with him from theNetherlands, it went through him. And if my half-brother had to go to theinternet cafe, he needed money for that.”
Quote >>> All the years I could have found her, I’ve missed her>> Kristian van der Mark
Contact with his half-brother faded. Kristian started to have doubts becausehe couldn’t get in touch with him normally. In 2019 he went again without atrace gone. ,,They only gave me Edwin Vela’s e-mail address. I then emailedhim a few times. When I wanted to go to Colombia and visit my half-brotherwith him, he turned it down. “Then find someone else,” he replied.
Biological mother
In the end Kristian was helped by Barbara and she did track down his realbiological mother. That turned out to be a completely different woman than by_without a trace_ found earlier. Together with Van der Spek, they went toColombia for a DNA test. “All those years that I could have found her, Imissed her,” says Kristian after the positive result in the Van der Spekbroadcast.
The so-called half-brother he had contact with turned out not to be his half-brother. ,,I’ll take without a trace too bad they didn’t check if everythingwas correct. They also did not answer. I already indicated at the time thatthings were not right, but they never answered me.”
Van der Spek indicates that without a trace has used the services of Velauntil 2010. From 2017, his help was occasionally requested again. “But I thinkit’s over now.”
Barbara contacted several times Without a trace. “They said we’ll call youback. We will look for your file and you will hear from us. Actually, Ihaven’t heard from them since the broadcast.” Following the episode of Van derSpek’s program, the makers of without a trace do contact her. “Even thenthey were still under the impression that I did receive my file. So far Idon’t know anything about my search and they don’t answer.”
The broadcast of Kees van der Spek: Scammers tackled can be seen tonight at8.30 pm on RTL 5.
Response KRO-NCRV
The broadcaster KRO-NCRV says after the broadcast of Jinek , in which Vander Spek already explained what he encountered when making his program, thathe was ‘shocked’ by the findings. We’ve been making for over 30 years withouta trace and know better than anyone how important it is to know where youcome from,” the statement said.
Published last summer without a trace on his website the story of daughterIsabel and mother Maria (names fictitious on request) about a match thatturned out not to be a match sixteen years later.