St. Pete mother reunites with son put up for adoption after nearly 30 years

By FOX 13 News Staff
Published  January 17, 2025 6:05pm EST
FOX 13 News
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Mother, son reunited nearly 30 years after adoption

FOX 13's Ariel Plasencia reports on a Pinellas County mother, Tonya Woodard, who was recently reunited with her son, Damon Alley, nearly 30 years after he was put up for adoption.

The Brief

    • A Pinellas County mother and son have reconnected years after a 1996 adoption.
    • The mother says she was promised a meeting years earlier but was lied to by a now-defunct adoption agency.
    • The pair have plans to meet in person in March.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - A Pinellas County mother recently reunited with her son nearly 30 years after he was put up for adoption.

Damon and Tonya speaking with FOX 13 News.

"I was just so proud of the fact that he cared about things that matter," Tonya Woodard said after reuniting with her son, Damon Alley, last week. "I was proud to say he's my child. Whether he was raised in my home or not, he's still my child."

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Mother and Son

The backstory:

Alley was born in St. Petersburg in 1996. When he was three months old, Woodard made a tough decision.

"I was already a mom of two daughters, and his father and I were not together. And I was in my twenties," Woodard told FOX 13. "I was scared for him. And so that's why I sought out Adoption by Choice, which is the agency that I used." 

Pictured: Damon as a child.

According to a 2009 FOX 13 story by longtime reporter Warren Elly, Adoption by Choice (ABC) was a "not-for-profit Christian agency" that "became the Bay Area’s busiest." 

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ABC’s legal troubles

Dig deeper:

But, that was a lie, because that meeting never happened, she told FOX 13. The next day, her infant son was already on his way to his new adoptive parents in Oregon.

"I felt like I was duped," Woodard said.

ABC later found itself in legal trouble: In 2009, the agency’s leadership pleaded guilty to stealing money from clients.

Meeting for the first time

What's next:

Woodard mentioned her connection to this agency to investigators at Birthparentfinder.com when she reached out to the California-based organization earlier this month, asking them for help in finding Alley. 

And, just last week, mom and son reunited for the first time over Zoom.   

Pictured: Tonya and Damon speaking over Zoom in January.

"Who's going to make the first move? And we both want to make the move, but we are afraid," Alley said when describing what it felt like leading up to the meeting last Friday. "So I basically just was open, like, yeah, this is how it is. Like I'm ready to go jump into the deep end." 

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Alley lives in Brazil, and Woodard lives in St. Petersburg. 

They have plans to get together in person to celebrate the 80th birthday of Woodard’s mom in New Jersey in March, which is where Alley will meet other family members and learn more about his Florida history.

"Just want to set the record straight on that: My father wasn’t some dishonorable man," Alley said of his biological father, who suffered a traumatic brain injury. "[Woodard] did what, at the time, she thought was the best decision for me, which I appreciate. That was pretty selfless for her to do."

Birthparentfinder.com’s impact

Big picture view:

Alley praised Birthparentfinder.com for reuniting his family. 

A screenshot of Birthparentfinder.com's homepage.

"Many people choose our company, because we excel at explaining to birth relatives the reasons behind our clients' outreach. In this instance, we successfully connected Tonya with her son Damon, resulting in a wonderful outcome for both of them. We are eagerly looking forward to their in-person meeting," Birthparentfinder.com CEO Jay Rosenzweig told FOX 13. 

"It was the greatest surprise of my life," Alley said.

The Source: All the information in this story was gathered by FOX 13 News and courtesy of Tonya Woodward, Damon Alley and birthparentdinder.com.

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