Transcript of The Journey, Episode 1: Gifts New

Hi, it's Madeleine Barron. I'm so excited to bring you this new story from the brilliant investigative reporter Ava Kaufman and our longtime incredible producer Natalie Jablonski. Ava is a staff writer for The New Yorker, and in my perhaps biased view, one of the most astounding investigative reporters working today. And the story, well, I'll let it speak for itself, but this one has really made me think deeply about what makes a family. Who gets to be a parent, and how little recourse there is for anyone when things go terribly wrong. We'll be releasing new episodes every week, but if you want to listen to the entire series right now, with no waiting and no ads, you can do that by subscribing to The New Yorker for just $1 a week. Go to newyorker.com/dark to subscribe and listen ad-free in The New Yorker app. Becoming a subscriber will get you access not just to this series, but to all of our past seasons, and to everything the magazine offers. And here's the thing about becoming a subscriber. This kind of work we do, this in-depth investigative reporting and meticulous production, can take a long time. We actually have a whole other story that's coming out soon that I've been working on for more than a year.

All of this is expensive. We're traveling, we're knocking on doors, we're reviewing thousands of pages of records. If you're already a subscriber to The New Yorker, thank you. And if not, please help us out by subscribing today.

Alrighty guys, so I know it's been a while. My name is Kayla if y'all are just now stumbling upon my page. I am 26 years old, I live in Texas, and this is my first time being a gestational surrogate. So I'm kind of sharing my experience, but, um—

Last year, I started watching videos posted online by a woman in Corpus Christi, Texas.

This will be my 5th pregnancy. I have 4 bio kids. I'm very new at YouTubing, so bear with me. I'm still getting the hang of actually speaking and looking at the camera and making videos.

Kayla Elliott was about to carry a child for strangers. She figured about 9 months of work and then it'd be over. In the delicate jargon of the fertility industry, the experience is called a journey.

Please subscribe and you will get some little sneak peeks of my journey in pregnancy.

Like every surrogate mother, Kayla understood the baby was not hers. It was a gift for someone else. Kayla was carrying a baby for a couple who told her they desperately wanted a second child and who tried unsuccessfully to conceive.

And I say this with all my heart, guys, like, if I could give my fertility Just a sliver of it to every mom out there who's struggling with fertility, I would do it in a heartbeat. I mean, I would, like, no questions asked. Like, I, you know, I love the fact that I could help another family, and I don't see—

She kept posting updates and videos, mostly on TikTok, so that her family and friends could follow along.

Here it is, guys. 17 weeks today. Little baby girl. Belly bump. We're loving being a surrogate.

But Kayla's journey would take her somewhere unexpected. Her posts would eventually attract a very different audience.

Popped up.

My friend sent it to me on TikTok.

I checked my email, and here my attorney had sent us a TikTok. And that's what really stopped me in my tracks.

And I was just scrolling, and then I seen the names. And I was like, my heart just stopped. Like, are you serious?

It started to, like, make me shake. I was getting so upset and worried.

Kayla would end up becoming a whistleblower, drawing attention to a confounding scheme that had been going on for years. And now to a bizarre story in the San Gabriel Valley. The first thought that went into my head is, oh my God, like, what don't we know?

This is one of the craziest stories I've ever heard.

Kayla would be swept up into a much larger scandal. One that's still unfolding, and that threatens to undermine the entire surrogacy industry. There's clearly a loophole in relation to surrogacy. That's not a loophole. That's surrogacy as designed. The scandal would raise uncomfortable questions about who gets to be a parent. I'm really afraid that people who have no other way to have a family, this will be taken away from them. And it would prompt investigations by child welfare and law enforcement agencies.

For all intents and purposes, she's kidnapped their child. That's what she's done. The Bureau refused to comment on the case, but Arcadia police confirmed that their detectives are working with the FBI. We believe that it extended beyond our city and into possibly other parts of the country and maybe internationally.

I'm Eva Kaufman. An investigative reporter at The New Yorker. From In the Dark and The New Yorker, this is The Journey. Episode 1, Gifts.

Hello.

Hey.

Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. Ava.

Nice to meet you.

Pleasure.

I'm trying to dig up information for you on my old— No rush.

Hi. Nice to meet you.

Hi, I'm Ava.

Yes. Kind of crazy here.

I'm sorry.

I'm gonna get my kids settled over there eating with their mommies so that they're not—

There's no rush.

So where do you live at? You live in New York?

I live in Los Angeles.

Oh, Los Angeles?

Yeah.

Oh, so you live right—

I live 20 minutes from there. From all this crazy stuff.

Yeah.

So that's how I got onto the story. It's in my local news, you know? One day last fall, I visited Kayla Elliott and her boyfriend, Blake Murray. They live in Corpus Christi near the Gulf. It's marshy, and at low tide, you can smell the water. Ducks, chickens, goats, and a pig roam their grassy backyard. Inside, it was crowded too. 4 kids, plus cats, kittens, fish, even a foreign exchange student who'd recently arrived.

This is Diego. Hey, this is Diego from France. He's our foreign exchange student. Poor kid. He got here in, like, the midst of it, and he's like, what is going on? I had to try to explain to him why you were coming because I don't even think he— do you even really understand what happened? Like, with my surrogate thing?

Yeah.

Kind of? He's just here.

Kayla's surrogate thing began in 2024, not long after she turned 26. What was the conversation between you guys about wanting to do that?

Well, for us, the whole goal— Yeah, his dad's friend mentioned about how his friend's wife Like, made a lot of money doing surrogacy. She loves having babies and being a mother. And I love being pregnant, but my tubes are tied. And so I can't have any more naturally. And so I was like, you know, well, what better way to, like, save money for our family and also give someone else, you know, a gift that they deserve to have a child? And that was the motivation behind it, you know?

Back then, Blake supported the family with his job as a pest control technician. Kayla was mostly a stay-at-home mom. Though she sometimes took on work cleaning rich people's houses. The couple and Kayla's 4 kids lived with Blake's dad. With the money from surrogacy, they'd be able to rent a place of their own.

So I joined some Facebook groups. I think it was Surrogates and Intended Parents, and there was a few other groups. And, and then I posted like a picture of myself with a profile, like, this is who I am, this is my age, this is where I live. Like, I'm just kind of curious for If anybody wants to reach out kind of thing.

Almost immediately, Kayla got a message. It was from an agency in Los Angeles called Marc Surrogacy. Its coordinators told her they'd matched her with a set of intended parents, or IPs as they're known in the industry. Okay, so they started by saying, hey, do you want to have a baby for this couple?

Yeah, basically they were like, hey Kayla, uh, we have a Chinese couple that's ready to get started, you know, are you interested in talking? And I was like, yes.

The agency shared a profile of the couple they had in mind. It showed a paunchy 64-year-old man, his arm draped around a younger woman with short-cropped black hair. The profile said they lived in Arcadia, California, a city just outside LA. They'd been married 3 years, had one child, a daughter, a sweetheart, the profile said, who wanted nothing more than a brother or sister. They'd already gone through 10 rounds of IVF.

It seemed like, okay, you know, they've, they've tried and tried. They've been unsuccessful, like, you know, all these years. And, and so who better to come in and help them have a baby than someone that's great at having a baby, you know?

The intended parents' names were Guojun Xuan and Sylvia Zhang. And after reading their story, Kayla was moved. Kayla herself had been adopted at birth by a woman who'd struggled with infertility. Now she wanted to help this couple from Arcadia. She hadn't met or considered any other intended parents through the agency, but she was flattered that they seemed so eager to get started with her. It would be an honor, they had written, if you carry the baby for us. Kayla said yes. Like most surrogates, Kayla would be what's known as a gestational carrier, meaning she wouldn't have any genetic ties to the child. It wasn't her egg. The couple's embryo was made from an anonymous donor egg and sperm from the intended father, Gwojun. Kayla began the months-long process of preparing her body to receive the embryo. She posted about the steps on TikTok.

Long story short, guys, we're excited. It's happening.

We're already—

There were medical screenings.

They know me by name when I walk in now. They're like, good morning, Kayla. I'm like, hello, just here for more blood work.

And rounds of hormone injections.

Wednesday, y'all can do my shots with me. First I ice, then I find a location.

These shots came with side effects.

My hips are bruised and knotted and red and itchy, and it's just horrid. But totally a blessing for diabetes, of course.

After all this, Kayla grew concerned. She hadn't heard directly from the IPs. She sent worried messages to the agency, Mark's Surrogacy. She read me a few of them.

I remember reading their profile beforehand, and they said they wanted their surrogate to be a lifelong friend, so I hope for more of that connection. It's sad not being able to talk to them, to be honest. Oh, wow. Yeah, see, I was really like, Why am I not talking to them? What's going on? And see, I remember they kept telling me constantly, IPs are very busy. That's what they tell me all the time. IPs are very busy, very busy. They're business owners, very busy. That's what they would tell me.

The coordinators reassured her she would meet the IPs on the day of the embryo transfer, which was scheduled for July 2024. For the procedure, Kayla flew from Corpus Christi to a fertility clinic in LA where the couple's embryo was stored.

As an adult, I haven't been on a plane, so this will be quite an experience.

The transfer was quick, like a pap smear. The doctor threaded a catheter through Kayla's cervix and then, using a long syringe, gently placed the embryo in her uterus. In the waiting room, Kayla learned that Sylvia wasn't coming. Apparently, she was sick with a stomach bug. Gwojun was there, though, looking just like his picture. If maybe a bit older.

It was almost like relief actually seeing the dad walk in because I was like, it is him, you know? And so it was kind of like a breath of— a breath of relief. It's him and it's real.

Guojun presented Kayla with a series of gifts: a bouquet of pink roses, a red envelope stuffed with cash, and a gilded jade bracelet. As Guojun fastened the bracelet onto Kayla's wrist, He explained, through a translator, that the jewelry represented an invitation to join his family.

I just thought it was the coolest thing. Like, oh, you know, they care about me. Like, this is really cool. Like, I felt honored, you know what I mean, that I was receiving this as a gift.

In a photograph taken that day, Kayla stands beside Guo Jun. He's petite, dressed like a businessman. She's wearing leggings, the new bracelet, Her neck tattoo peeks out from a yellow crop-top hoodie that says Santa Monica. She'd visited the pier that morning. The two of them are smiling, showing off a printout of the ultrasound.

He's holding a picture of the little— I mean, it's not much to see. It looks like a little grain of rice, but that's the embryo that they implanted.

That embryo stuck. Kayla was pregnant. Now that she was caring for the couple, Kayla started receiving installments of her salary. It was good money, more than she'd ever made, around $4,500 a month, plus pregnancy-related expenses. She'd even get an allowance for a house cleaner of her own.

Like, that's how we moved here. That's how we got my car. Like, there's a lot of things great that came from that to help my family as well.

Um, tell me a little bit more about that. What are the kinds of things you were able to start doing, you know?

Oh, like just taking the kids, like, I don't say like amusement parks, but stuff like that, you know what I mean? Just places that we normally wouldn't have money to save to go and do, we were able to just like not even think about it and just do it, you know what I mean?

Which is so nice.

Besides paying bills and seeing what we had left, Christmas was awesome for the kids. Oh yeah, Christmas went well. Like, this money really ultimately went to the kids.

Surrogacy is difficult work. It requires not only physical fortitude, but a certain emotional rigor. To do a good job, you have to train yourself not to get too attached. At the same time, it's inevitable to be thinking about the living being you're growing. Everything you eat, how much you sleep, how much stress you're under, all of it can affect the baby.

Hello, TikTok. Kayla here, surrogate, almost 31 weeks.

As Kayla entered her third trimester, communication with the IPs was still spotty. And now she was dealing with some medical complications.

I spent 10 hours in the ER yesterday and it's just been a nightmare.

There were migraines that made it impossible for her to stand, and she was having trouble with her vision.

I'm tired.

I don't feel like myself. I can't even go outside because the light hurts my eyes. I'm just— I am miserable.

Kayla was diagnosed with papilledema, which is when excess pressure in the brain causes the optic nerve to swell.

I kept telling myself, you know, I have 4 beautiful children. I want to see them grow up, and I can't lose my eyesight over this.

A doctor told her the condition could make an epidural risky, so she might need to have an unmedicated labor, a prospect which terrified her.

If you have any tips for me for an all-natural, unmedicated birth, please let me know. This is delivery number 5, and I'm, like, totally freaked.

With her due date approaching, Kayla was trying to stay upbeat.

I have, at the minimum, at least 7 weeks left to bake this little baby, get her all nice and plump for her mom and dad. Bake, little baby, bake.

She was scheduled for an induction on March 13th, 2025. That night, as she lay in bed at the hospital in Corpus Christi, waiting for an IV drip to start, Kayla kept making videos.

All right, guys, we made it. I think Blake's nervous. I'm not nervous. I think you're nervous. No, I think you're nervous. No, I don't think you're nervous. They're about to take us to labor and delivery to start the process. I'm nervous.

I'm scared.

But let's get this baby out.

Kayla had shared the date with the agency, Marc Surrogacy, beforehand so the intended parents would be ready to travel to Texas and take their baby back to LA. But as Kayla started having contractions, Sylvia and Gwojun hadn't yet arrived.

I was getting worried, you know, like, oh my gosh, are they coming or what's happening? And really, I was just confused because it's like, hello, I'm about to have your, your child.

The labor started in the early afternoon. Around 8 that night, Kayla gave birth to a healthy baby girl. Still no sign of Gwojun or Sylvia. The nurses brought the baby over to Kayla for skin-to-skin contact. Her tiny hand rested on Kayla's tattooed chest. She was a long baby, with a shock of black hair tucked beneath a pink and blue beanie. And her mouth was open, as though she'd just been surprised. Kayla was enthralled, though she knew these were probably their last moments together. After an hour, the nurses took the infant away. Later that night, Kayla got a text from Sylvia. that she'd made it to the hospital.

I was almost kind of like, okay, like, someone's there with her, you know, someone that's not just a hospital worker or a nursery worker, you know what I mean? So it felt almost like safe at that point because I was like, okay, I can kind of rest now.

The next morning, Sylvia came to see Kayla. It was the first time the 2 women actually met. Sylvia looked frail, and when they hugged, Kayla could feel the bones through her leather jacket. Sylvia showed the same largesse that Gwojun had at the embryo transfer, placing $2,000 in cash in Kayla's lap and doling out $100 bills to everyone else in the room. Kayla's mom, Blake, 2 of Kayla's kids. But when it came to the actual baby, Sylvia seemed a little blasé.

She didn't really hold the baby much. She didn't— barely looked at the baby. The baby was just kind of laying in the little bassinet thing they roll them around in. You know, she just wasn't very attentive, I guess you could say. It was just very like— like a nanny picking up a baby or something. You know what I mean? It was so weird.

Sylvia asked Blake and Kayla for a ride to the airport. So they got to see the baby one more time. As they said goodbye, Sylvia handed them $500. And then the journey was over. Back home, Kayla cried for 2 weeks. She'd mentally prepared herself to give up the child, but it was as if her body had yet to catch up with what her mind already knew. She posted on TikTok.

It was really hard. Um, and like I said, guys, I'm not crying, you know, mourning the, the, uh, the baby specifically. I'm mourning the chapter closing because it was, um, it was an experience for sure, a beautiful one. And, um, it just flew by like so fast. And a lot of my hormones are just like postpartum baby blues kind of thing, but Um, I didn't expect to be this emotional, so it's really just kind of strange to me.

It helped that Sylvia became somewhat more responsive. She shared with Kayla the baby's name and sent her some videos.

She was a big old cheek.

Oh my gosh. Kayla showed me one where the baby girl, bright-eyed and square-faced, is wiggling around in a onesie patterned with hearts. I haven't seen the pictures of her face up close.

Oh.

As they began to text a little more, Sylvia shared she was in a hurry to have another child and asked Kayla if she would carry for her family again. Kayla wasn't sure. She'd only been not pregnant for just a few weeks, and it'd be several months until her body would be ready. And she had another reason to hesitate. About halfway through Kayla's pregnancy, she'd heard something weird, though it seemed, at the time, easy enough to explain away. Kayla had been scrolling through Facebook When she discovered there was a woman in Pennsylvania who was also carrying a baby for Sylvia and Gwojun. This was a surprise. Kayla wasn't aware that the couple had hired another surrogate. The 2 women started messaging, and the other surrogate told Kayla something else. Like Kayla, she'd been led to believe that the IPs had just one child. When in fact, they already had multiple children. Kayla was shocked, but the surrogate in Pennsylvania told her she didn't think the situation was shady, just strange. Kayla wrote to the agency, Marc Surrogacy, to express her confusion. A coordinator there told her the couple just wanted a large family and noted a little casually, quote, they definitely don't have a million kids.

Kayla felt uneasy, but it wasn't as though she could just back out. She was already pregnant. The baby was coming, as was the salary. She decided to follow the advice of the couple's other surrogate, who told her they both just had to suck it up and deal. But now, 2 months after Kayla gave birth, the mystery of the intended parents and their many children returned. This time, at a far more alarming scale. It began, again, on Facebook. Kayla was added to a group chat by someone who'd seen one of her posts on social media. The chat contained a few more women who'd also been surrogates for Sylvia and Gwojun. Even stranger, these women had discovered that Mark's surrogacy had been opened by Sylvia. The couple had set up the agency for themselves, and they seemed to be using it to recruit women across the country to have multiple children for them at the same time. The idea the couple just wanted a big family now seemed less plausible. If that was the case, why'd they open their own agency? And why'd they lie to the surrogates about only having 1 or 2 kids? Some of the women in the group chat Formed the suspicion that Sylvia and Guojun might be selling the children.

Kayla was horrified. She'd put herself through a grueling experience, all to give strangers the gift of life. Now she felt manipulated, used.

I was really upset. Like, I was, I was really mad because, um, it was crazy, you know? And it just, it was a lot.

She decided to post again on TikTok. In the video, she shared what she'd been hearing about the couple and their dubious agency. We don't have the audio of this one. Kayla said she was soon asked to take it down by an FBI agent. But before she removed it, the video went viral.

So, it blew up. It really, it blew up really quick.

As Kayla's story made its way around the internet, it was seen by one set of people in particular: the many, many other surrogates who'd also carried for the same couple, each believing they'd been the only one.

Popped up.

My friend sent it to me on TikTok.

And so I checked my email, and here my attorney had sent us a TikTok. And I'm like, oh, well, why is my attorney sending me TikTok videos?

She's like, look at this. She's all, can you imagine? I go, I go, I— what do you mean, can I imagine? That's the lady we had the baby for. I was like, yeah, that's the name on my contract. That's the father in my contract.

So already at that point, I'm like, oh my God, okay, we're linked.

And that's what really stopped me in my tracks.

I started crying. I was like, what the heck did I just get myself into?

In February of 2024, celebrated illustrator and children's book author Petra Mathers and her husband Michael mailed letters to dozens of friends and family members to let them know they had died by suicide. Dear honeys, this is goodbye. By the time you get this letter, both Petra and I will be dead.

Next stop, Wonderland.

Why did they do it? And what did it do to the people they left behind? Listen to Death of an Artist wherever you get your podcasts.

That spring and summer, the surrogates for Sylvia and Gojun began to find one another. Under different circumstances, they might have had little in common. They lived in Virginia, Georgia, Pennsylvania. Florida, California. They were white, Hispanic, Black, Asian, lesbians, aspiring tradwives, military spouses, single moms. Some opposed abortion. One had worked in an abortion clinic. But thrust into the same unnerving situation, they quickly bonded as they tried to figure out what was going on. Some of the surrogates created group chats on Facebook. They started swapping photographs of the same jade bracelets, same envelopes filled with cash, and same intended mother smiling at their bedsides hours after they'd given birth.

These were pictures, like, of Sylvia in the same exact outfit, the same leather jacket, like, the same outfit to the T. I mean, there— you just can't say, like, oh no, that's not me. Like, it is you, you know what I mean? And it's like, you know, Like, indisputable evidence.

For the surrogates, even sharing these details could be risky. Most surrogacy contracts require confidentiality. If the marked surrogates revealed personal information about the intended parents, they could be forced to repay the money they'd earned or even be sued. But the risk seemed worth taking. The surrogates worried about the children they'd carried and why the couple had wanted so many of them. They wondered whether they'd been unwitting participants in some kind of dystopian mass breeding scheme, or if they'd carried babies for human traffickers. They started sending tips to the FBI. An FBI agent responded and asked the women questions about their journeys, though the agent wouldn't tell them much in return. Kayla was desperate to find out if the newborn she'd carried was okay. For days, she texted and called Sylvia. She was hoping Sylvia might be able to reassure her. Finally, Sylvia called her back. And immediately, Sylvia told Kayla something that made Kayla even more alarmed. She and Guojun had just spent 4 days in jail. When Kayla heard this, she started recording the call.

Yeah, they put my husband and me all in the jail.

Oh my goodness.

Sylvia didn't explain exactly why she'd been arrested.

They take me into a jail 4 days. They take my phone, use my phone to text to everybody. This is so bad, a police officer.

Oh my gosh.

But she alluded to a police investigation regarding child trafficking.

So they say I'm selling the baby. I'm not selling the baby.

All the baby leaving with Sylvia said, I'm not selling the baby. The babies were all living with her and Guo Jun.

Yeah. We spent a lot of money.

We want to be the family here.

We spent a lot of money, Sylvia told Kayla. We want to be the family here.

No, I, I believe you. I understand what you're saying. I just was— I was trying to figure out why all these other girls were saying these horrible things.

The conversation was bizarre. Sylvia spent the first few minutes lamenting that the police had taken away her phone.

So they're still holding my phone, don't want to give it to me. They say also, and my phone, I don't have a phone to call.

Kayla remained sympathetic and kept trying to steer the conversation back to the baby she'd carried. Was she safe?

No, I understand. I believe you. I just, like I said, I was really concerned. And then, of course, you know, I understand that, you know, she isn't my baby, but still, Having, you know, given birth to her and meeting you and caring about you. It's just—

I mean— It wasn't entirely clear whether Sylvia even knew which of her surrogates she was talking to. At one point, she mentioned what sounded like a different baby carried by someone else.

Yeah, I thought I was trying to get into contact with your, your stage, uh, to get the baby back.

Okay, wait, I think you're confused as to who you're talking to because I This is Kayla.

Um, yeah, you are Kayla, was helping me to have the baby, right?

Yes. Yeah, I had the baby.

Uh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, so—

After a lot of unsatisfying back and forth, Kayla got one clue about the baby. She wasn't with Sylvia. She was with DCFS, the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services. So Kayla dialed the DCFS hotline, hoping someone official could finally tell her what was going on.

I called and spoke to a lady, I guess, at the main line, whoever you call. And she basically— I kind of had to haggle with her for a minute because she didn't want to tell me anything. And I said, look, look, I'm a surrogate. I am the child's birth mom. I gave birth to this baby. And she was like, okay. She said, well, she said, I can't give, you know, any, you know, too much information.

Child welfare cases in California are confidential. Since Kayla wasn't actually related to the baby, she didn't have the legal right to know anything about her. But by emphasizing her unusual connection to the child, she managed to get herself transferred to 2 caseworkers.

And I'm just like pacing back and forth through the house, like absolutely just shocked at what I was hearing.

This is when Kayla learned the true number of children that the couple had.

And the man, I never got his name, but he said that, yeah, there was like 21 children.

21 children, most under the age of 3.

And he was saying that it was just the wildest thing ever, that like all these children looked like related but not related. Like hair colors were semi-different and eye colors, and some looked more mixed than others. And it was just a really crazy— like they said they'd never seen anything Like that.

It turned out that Sylvia and Gwojun had been jailed on suspicion of child endangerment. The couple had been released without charges, but the police investigation was ongoing. Meanwhile, the children had been taken into temporary foster care. A juvenile dependency court in LA would be looking into the situation to decide whether or not Sylvia and Gwojun could get them back. This was an overwhelming set of facts for Kayla and the other surrogates to take in. And there wasn't much they could do. Surrogacy in the United States is largely unregulated, a multi-billion-dollar industry underwritten by good intentions. It's harder to open a hair salon than it is to open a surrogacy agency. And if something goes wrong at an agency, there's no licensing department to appeal to No regulatory body to report to. No federal laws govern the intimate act of bringing strangers together to create a new life. There is, however, that one universal rule for surrogates: don't get attached. The Mark surrogates had known this from the start of their journeys.

You tell yourself, like, this, this isn't your child. I mean, those are things that you should know before even, like, applying to be a surrogate. Like, this is not your baby. Like, you don't get attached.

But now they began to question whether that rule still applied. The intended parents had been in jail and were under investigation by police and the FBI, and their children had been placed in foster care. Kayla said if she'd known that this was going to happen to the baby she'd given birth to, she would have never handed her over to Sylvia. She liked to say that she would have fled with her over the border to Mexico. For Kayla, this was just a soothing fantasy. The baby she'd carried was already in the foster system. But that wasn't true for everyone. Because at that very moment, several women were still caring for Sylvia and Gwojun. In fact, in May 2025, At the time of the parents' arrest, 6 more babies were still on the way.

In February of 2024, celebrated illustrator and children's book author Petra Mathers and her husband Michael mailed letters to dozens of friends and family members to let them know they had died by suicide. Dear honeys, This is goodbye.

By the time you get this letter, both Petra and I will be dead. Next stop, Wonderland.

Why did they do it? And what did it do to the people they left behind? Listen to Death of an Artist wherever you get your podcasts.

Record your message at the tone. When you are finished, hang up or press pound for more options.

Yes, Detective. Hi, my name is Stacy King. I am currently pregnant in the state of Virginia with a couple's baby, and I'm just trying to see what I can come up with paperwork-wise to protect the baby that, that will be coming in the next little while. Um, if you could please give me a call back, I would appreciate it. Thank you.

Stacy King lives in Chesapeake, Virginia, and works at a shop that installs audio accessories.

Yeah, we do boats, we do cars, we do houses. Um, they even do the little golf carts.

I met up with her in the shop one afternoon with our producer Natalie Jablonski, and Stacy led us to her office in the back.

So I can't guarantee it's gonna be quiet.

Oh, it's okay.

Understood.

You might hear Bass occasionally. Oh, that's great.

Stacey is the shop's bookkeeper. She's exceptionally organized. And like Kayla, she was so excited about her surrogacy journey that she documented nearly every step along the way. She and her husband got matching t-shirts. His read, it's not mine. Hers, it's not mine either. She was nearly 4 months away from giving birth to a baby girl for Sylvia and Gwojun. When she first heard about the other women. She'd come across a warning posted on Facebook by a surrogate who'd seen Kayla's TikTok.

I freaked out. I was at home. Um, my husband was in the shower. Um, I was trying to read through it, and I can feel, like, my heart rate speeding up and time slowing down.

It was as if she'd taken a fast-acting drug.

And it's already— like, it was already starting to take effect at that point of figuring out, holy crap, this is real. And I— my daughter coming up to me, Mommy, Mommy. And I'm trying to pay attention to her but read this at the same time.

She wasn't sure what to do, so she contacted the lawyer who'd reviewed her surrogacy contract.

Yeah, I emailed him.

He emailed me that evening. What does your email first say? Uh, scared spitless.

What do I do?

It read, scared spitless. What do I do? The lawyer didn't seem too concerned. Basically, he said, as long as she was still getting paid and as long as the pregnancy was going smoothly, she should keep calm and carry on. She eventually talked to other lawyers who told her the same thing. She should follow the terms of her contract, which meant staying in touch with the intended parents and handing over the baby as soon as she was born. What are the thoughts going through your head in terms of what's going to happen to baby girl?

Um, this is a lot.

It was a whole lot. I just wanted her— I wanted to be safe. I wanted her to be safe. My next thought was just Trying to make sure she came out healthy.

Stacey panicked, and then she felt guilty for panicking. She didn't want to cause any stress to the baby.

There were days where I couldn't come to work. Like, I had to call in and say, like, look, this is what I've hit. I can't come in today.

She had so many questions. Would Sylvia and Guojun still be allowed to come to Virginia to pick up the baby if they were under investigation? And even if Stacey could hand the baby over to them, would it be the right thing to do? Stacey joined one of the group chats made up of surrogates who'd carried for the couple. One of them had delivered a baby girl the same weekend that Sylvia and Guojun had spent in jail. That surrogate was still recovering from a C-section when her county's child welfare agency took the newborn away. Stacey wanted to find out Whether there was anything she could do to intervene before it was too late.

Record your message at the tone.

When you are finished, hang up or press pound. She started calling around to all the authorities she could think of.

Yes, Detective. Hi, my name is Stacey King. Uh, yes. Hi, my name is Stacey King. I'm almost 38 weeks pregnant and I'm I'm just trying to see what I can do. I just— I need some advice, and she referred me to you guys.

Press 9 to continue. Good morning, Stacy.

I'm a victim specialist with FBI LA.

Um, if you would give me a call—

Hi, Miss King.

This is Anthony, uh, Los Angeles County DCFS Social Work.

Could you please give me a call back as soon as possible?

Thank you.

Just going through these and just thinking about the number of agencies, too, you're dealing with. It's so many different entities, from the law firm, from the LA Social Services, Virginia Social Services, FBI, local police.

I mean—

I even tried calling and talking to people in the foster care system, trying to figure out how to become a foster parent to her.

Jaycee wasn't even sure if that would be legal. In states like California, the courts are explicit that gestational surrogates don't have any claim to the children they're carrying. If a surrogate could change her mind at any point in the process, then the contract she'd signed would be meaningless. It's not difficult to see how introducing ambiguity into these kinds of transactions could lead the surrogacy industry to collapse. None of the couple's surrogates had gone into this line of work because they'd wanted another kid of their own. If anything, the opposite was true. Kayla had had her tubes tied. Stacey had that it's not mine t-shirt. But now, many of the surrogates were raising questions about their contracts. They were wondering about their custody rights. And in doing so, they were unintentionally putting the industry to an unprecedented test.

We ended up calling Children and Youth. And explaining it to them really early on back in June or July.

Alexa Fossold was a long-distance bus driver in central Pennsylvania. She was due around the same time as Stacey, in October 2025, and she had a lot of the same questions.

And everybody kept telling us the answer of, there's no baby yet, so we can't help you. And so I was like, Oh, okay. Like, so wait, like, what does that mean? Like, you're gonna wait till the day I give birth to step in and help us? Like, what, what does that mean for us? Like, am I gonna have to take the baby home and then, and then call Children and Youth afterwards?

Making things even trickier was the fact that it's difficult to report concerns to a child welfare agency about a child that doesn't yet exist. Alexa told me she kept being asked for the child's date of birth. Which was obviously impossible to provide.

They didn't know what to tell us because there was no baby yet. They're like, well, are you like reporting— are you reporting yourself? Like, it's like, it was, it was really confusing to them.

Stacy, Alexa, and the other pregnant surrogates made dozens of calls like this, trying to figure out what to do. Mostly what they learned was that, at least for now, they were completely on their own. All they had was one another. They woke up messaging the group chat and went to sleep the same way. They traded notes on their doctor's appointments, sent each other ultrasound photos. They still weren't sure what would happen when they gave birth, if they'd even be allowed to bring the babies home. But tentatively, the women started to get ready. They texted about baby fever and how their inner mama bears were coming out. In, quote, full effing force, joked about buying land for a commune where they could collectively babysit. They traded advice on breast pumps, knit baby blankets, collected baby clothes. Even as they made these backup plans in secret, they stayed in touch with the intended parents, as required by their contracts. They shared screenshots of their ongoing communications with Sylvia. It was now a little funny when Sylvia mixed up their names or mailed them identical tins of mooncakes. Or sent them the same texts at the same time.

You're doing an amazing job, one of the messages said. I am reaching out in the hope that I might have the opportunity to visit you, said another. As part of this charm offensive, Sylvia also called some of the pregnant surrogates. Stacey was 2 months away from delivering and decided to record their conversation.

So I don't need to sell baby to keep the life, you know.

Mm-hmm.

Sylvia sounded calm, even as she defended herself against some of the rumors Stacey might have heard.

They just want to— I'm not sure why they say I'm human trafficking. And I told all my story to my attorney, several attorneys, and they say there's nothing looks like you have a criminal case here. So they are going to contact with a detective. To find out what's going on.

Okay.

Yeah.

It's, it's, it's been a lot.

Sylvia offered to fly to Stacy's house to explain herself in person.

Even I think I should fly to your place to tell you the stories. I'm not a bad person. We are working super hard to keep our life and keep We just want to have a family.

I'm not a bad person, she said. We just want to have a family.

I know you guys work, so like I've tried not to bother you too much. And, but like, honestly, it's, it's scary for us, or for me too, because like when they said they, you guys had more than one child, that kind of caught me off guard because I only thought you had one child.

Sylvia said she never tried to cheat anyone, and it sounds like Stacey is longing to believe her.

We're praying. It's like, maybe it's just a misunderstanding, you know? We've got to let the law and the courts do what they're supposed to.

You can hear Stacey trying to imagine what a mother separated from her children must be going through.

It's heartbreaking to, to even think about losing You know, losing your kids, let alone someone coming in and taking them. So I— my heart goes out to you. I, I know you're not doing well.

Sylvia told her the arrest in May was a big mix-up. She insisted she was a good mother. She'd done a good job raising her children.

Someday maybe I can invite you to my house. I can buy the ticket for you. You can see my child. They are really healthy and they are friendly. They're helping each other. They are independent.

They're helping each other. They're independent, she said.

They know put the trash to the trash can. They know how to take the shoes out, clothes out. Some of the children know how to put the clothes to the washer. Then they They're eating well, sleeping well. I'm following the doctor's appointments. I think I'm doing pretty good for the child. On the weekend, sometimes I bring them to go out to play.

The household Sylvia was describing sounded a bit austere. Little kids who knew how to throw away trash, put their clothes in the washing machine, and who sometimes were taken outside to play. Still, Stacey hoped for a connection, and she and Sylvia went on for a few minutes, trading notes about being mothers, about homeschooling and juggling work. Throughout the conversation, Sylvia seemed like she was confiding in Stacey.

I never talk with anyone. You are only person I talk with. The story, trust me.

Yeah.

I don't want you to tell anybody the stories.

Yeah. I might share it with my husband if that's okay.

That's okay, Sylvia said. Just don't talk to reporters.

I don't want some news reporter know my— know the court process. I don't want anybody to report anything.

I don't want anybody to report anything. But in early August, not long after that phone call, there was more reporting.

New at 5, disturbing details in police records as Arcadia—

Local news outlets obtained a copy of the police affidavit from the parents' arrest. Suddenly, Stacey and the surrogates had a clearer picture of why Sylvia and Guojun had ended up in jail. And why all their kids had been taken away.

We do have to warn you, the details and images in these documents are graphic.

According to the police, this had all started one morning 3 months earlier when officers showed up at Sylvia and Gwojun's house. They had just gotten a call from a nearby hospital. One of the couple's babies, who was 2 months old, had been admitted to the intensive care unit with severe head injuries. And doctors were concerned that he might have been abused. So detectives went to check out the baby's home address, a 10,000-square-foot mansion in the city of Arcadia. Inside, the police wondered if they'd entered some sort of unlicensed daycare. There were rooms filled with cribs and at least a dozen toddlers and infants seated at desks and high chairs inside makeshift classrooms. It was impossible to tell the girls and boys apart since all the children had their heads shaved. Police also noticed CCTV cameras everywhere, recording audio and video. On one tape, a nanny named Junmei Li appeared to hit the 2-month-old child who'd ended up in the hospital.

Arcadia police say security cameras inside this home show Li Placing him down out of camera sight while he can be heard crying. The baby cries for a few seconds until a thud or a hit is heard and crying suddenly stops.

This wasn't the only child who'd allegedly been abused. The footage also showed nannies forcing other children into squats, hitting them in the face, and spanking them on a table at the front of the classroom. There were so many hours of video, police were still going through it.

Police say while Sylvia Zhang and Guojun Chen were arrested and released, their investigation into them and what went on inside this home continues.

When we reached out to Sylvia and Guojun for comment on the series, one of their legal representatives told us he'd instructed the couple not to respond. But the couple has previously denied abusing any of their children. Or trafficking them. And one of their lawyers has told me the couple had done everything they could to protect their family. After seeing the images from inside the house, Stacey made a decision.

So, yeah, there is a switch. And it was around the I want to say the August timeframe, the switch did definitely flip. Like, you know what, let's start preparing to possibly bring her home.

It was a decision that, months ago, would have seemed unthinkable, even irrational. It would mean taking a huge legal risk. And it would mean getting attached.

No, we're not biologically related. But okay, even at that point, everything I eat, my blood, everything else of me goes into her to help her be better. So she is a part of me at that point. And then mama bear comes out and no, she's not mine. But you want to protect a child, an innocent being that you are carrying.

Stacey's 2 children embrace the idea.

They would listen to me put the monitor on my stomach and they could hear her heartbeat. And they would get so excited that they could hear her heartbeat and they would talk to her.

Her son raced cars on her stomach. Her daughter sang to the baby.

So, like, there was a point there where we were calling her Sissy because we were You know, considering further on into the pregnancy of keeping her.

Stacey was due in less than 2 months.

Like, every bone in our bodies was to protect this child. And if we could keep her, we would.

Coming up on The Journey.

Everybody always goes back to the same thing. Mija, how is it that the agency didn't know? Everybody always asked me that. Me and my coworker, we named her the surrogate pimp. She wanted to have a lot of surrogates at one time.

We're here because we love families.

We want families to grow. And then he pulled out a gun, and I mean, there was kind of like a standoff.

It's patently false that my client incited any sort of abuse of the child.

He doesn't believe in abusing children.

He actually believes in enriching them and giving them the best opportunities to succeed.

I was curious what you make of that decision, just given the fact pattern so far.

That's insane. That is fucking insane. I mean, we're at insane already. I can keep going, but I mean, we're at insane. I don't know what the next word is. I'll have to go check my thesaurus or something.

If you're a New Yorker subscriber, you can listen to the rest of The Journey right now, ad-free. Go to newyorker.com/dark to subscribe for just $1 a week, and then you can listen to all 5 episodes in the New Yorker app. For non-subscribers, new episodes will be released every Tuesday. The Journey is written and produced by me, Ava Kaufman, senior producer Natalie Jablonski, and producer Raymond Thungakar. Samara Freemark is the managing producer for the series. It's edited by Alison McAdam. Additional editing by Willing Davidson and Madeline Barron. Theme and original music by Alex Weston. Additional music by Chris Julin and Allison Leighton Brown. This episode was mixed by Cory Schruppel. Our art is by Vartika Sharma. Art direction by Aviva Maiklov and Ben Kothi. Fact-checking by Inwoe And Aman Hussein. Our summer research assistant is Ethan Kahn. Legal review by Fabio Bertoni and Ben Murray. Our managing editor is Julia Rothschild, with additional support from Chiara Ortiz. Thanks also to Parker Yesko. The editor of The New Yorker is David Remnick. If you have comments or story tips, please send them to the team at inthedark@newyorker.com. And make sure to follow In the Dark wherever you get your podcasts.

In the Dark is produced by The New Yorker.

In February of 2024, celebrated illustrator and children's book author Petra Mathers and her husband Michael mailed letters to dozens of friends and family members to let them know they had died by suicide. Dear honeys, this is goodbye.

By the time you get this letter, both Petra and I will be dead. Next stop, Wonderland.

Why did they do it? And what did it do to the people they left behind? Listen to Death of an Artist wherever you get your podcasts.