The third adoptive parents of Natalia Grace, a Ukrainian-born woman with dwarfism who some people believe had been an adult masquerading as a child, have fallen out with her.
Cynthia and Antwon Mans brought Grace, 22, into their home in 2012 after they discovered she had been living alone in Lafayette, Indiana.
But the couple is speaking out in a new Investigation Discovery documentary called The Curious Case of Natalia Grace: The Final Chapter.
A teaser for the documentary shows Antwon Mans telling the producers “Something ain’t right with Natalia.” He and his wife had previously described her as a “genuine and loving young lady,” according to the Daily Mail.
Grace first came to the US in 2008 and was placed with a couple who turned her away for undisclosed reasons, the outlet reported. In 2010, she was adopted by Michael and Kristine Barnett, her second adoptive parents who the newspaper says abandoned her.
The couple were later charged with abandoning and endangering a dependent. At the time, Kristine told the Daily Mail: “Natalia was a woman. She had periods. She had adult teeth. She never grew a single inch, which would happen even with a child with dwarfism. The doctors all confirmed she was suffering a severe psychological illness only diagnosed in adults.”
In October 2022, Michael Barnett was acquitted of the charges and Kristine Barnett had her charges dropped three weeks before her trial in March 2023.
The girl lived with the Barnetts for two years. The couple would later say she was a “sociopath” who had threatened to kill them. At one point, the couple said Grace stood over their beds with a knife and tried to poison Kristine.
Additionally, the couple doubted that Grace was born in 2003 because after she was under their care, she started getting public hair and getting her period, the outlet reported. A court later agreed to change Grace’s birth certificate to state she was born in 1989. That’s around the time they allegedly dropped her off at an apartment in Louisiana.
A DNA test this year confirmed Grace is around 22 years old. That would mean she was 10 years old when she began living with the Barnetts. Grace herself has publicly claimed she was a child when the couple left her in Lafayette.
Antwon insinuated to the documentary team that Grace had a romantic interest that turned her against them. “She’s got this dude online,” he said, according to the outlet. “He turned her against us. She’s ready to go to hell with gasoline panties on.”
In another documentary that aired in January, he and his wife told the team they were done with Grace. Other people interviewed for the documentary did not appear to paint the couple as the victims of the story.
Grace has since moved out of the couple’s home and is trying to raise money for a $500,000 spinal surgery that isn’t covered by insurance, according to the outlet.
“I have a type of dwarfism called Diastrophic Dysplasia – a form of dwarfism that has many serious issues which often require surgery,’ she wrote on GoFundMe. “The first treatment I need is to have my spine corrected as if I leave it too long it could lead to paralysis and incontinence.”
The documentary is premiering in January 2025 on Investigation Discovery.
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