2 Charged With Trying To Buy Child

Two American women were charged Sunday with trying to buy a child for adoption and smuggle it out of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula.

Prosecutor Javier Cal said the case appeared to be an isolated incident, not part of a child-trafficking ring. “That greatly calms us,” he said.

Laurie Henderson, 36, and her mother, Beverly Gehrke, of Madison, Wis., were charged with trafficking in children, a crime that carries a penalty of two to nine years in prison.

In presenting the case to a judge in Cancun early Sunday, prosecutors also charged Mrs. Henderson with presenting false information, a crime punishable by six months to three years in prison.