October 14th of 2021 I was finishing up an appointment with a friend when I heard from my husband at home. He had come across an Amazon Fire tablet in the couch cushions of our living room. Like any other slim, black bit of technology in our home it had slipped down and never been thought about again thanks to the two toddlers we had running the place. He plugged it in to get it charged up and discovered that the tablet was still linked to Kayla's Amazon Shopping account. Once I got home and took a big giant breath I tapped into the app, and the orders tab. You should all know I was absolutely looking to find one of those fake baby bumps you can put on under your clothes - the ones you see on tv they make the dads or teenage boys wear around to gain some empathy for pregnant women. I will not leave you on edge here - I did not find that. In fact, what I did see was that Kayla had not been purchasing anything off of Amazon much before 2017 at all. Late adopter to the convenience it seemed. What I did see though, took my breath away.
A book, a book about grief. A book about grief ordered January 11, 2017, almost a full month before Kayla supposedly endured the worst grief imaginable. What turned my stomach when I saw this was what I remembered about our first coffee date. Our very first 1:1 meeting where I shared every detail of my story about Henry and my abruption with him. At one point, she quoted this book to me. I recognized the quote and was beside myself that she had also read this book. It was pretty new, and by a regional author. This book truly impacted my grief journey. The words from this author made me feel normal in my thoughts and feelings and validated what it feels like IN grief, not 20 years past it. So, she already knew. She already knew how to be in grief, to sit in it. From what I could tell she studied it. Oddly a baby silk gift set purchased around the same time. I had heard from her friends that she had a well-stocked nursery ready to go for baby.
Then in January 2018 a purchase for a baby hat they typically provide in the hospital. This one made to look like the ones the nurses craft for you to look a little more feminine. I remember watching the nurses do this for my daughter when I had her in 2014. Purchased. For what? This was almost a year after Hope was allegedly born. Also, an eyebrow razor pack. Perhaps these could be used on your own eyebrows or if you are cutting an infant baby's whisps of hair to keep as a memorial or keepsake as they are often used by nurses in hospitals. Still though none of these purchases make sense almost a year after being pregnant.
Curiously, again in 2018 an order for an urn that matched exactly to the one I had for Henry except in color. If you remember, mine was Gold. The frustrating thing here for me was that we had a long conversation once about how limited your options are for tiny urns. I had told her I was in the funeral home looking for anything that looked right, and truly they were all terrible in my mind. It was a miserable experience, and my husband and I settled on the gold heart because it felt the least offensive. My description of offensive at the time was a teddy bear shaped clay pot, and an angel sitting on Jesus' lap. Just a big no thank you for us in that moment in our lives. The gold heart was chosen because the gold reminded us of Henry's full head of golden blonde, brown hair when the sun hit it the morning he was born. But here is this silver urn that Kayla and I had taken professional photos with together sharing about the mission of Hopeful Heart Project. She had agreed about the urn shopping experience and also had told me she had the funeral home split the ashes into two separate matching urns. One for her and one for Drew, her dad. But being such a deadbeat dad, he hadn't bothered to pick them up from her.
I guess she liked the urn when it arrived because she ordered another one to match it on February 19th. Now Drew would in fact have access to his daughter's ashes if he wanted. Also, Kayla would now be able to show me this matching urn once again with the tiny screws she could simply open when she wanted access what was inside. Sidenote - I'm pretty sure the funeral home up-charged me a significant amount on this item. However, I would never drag them over for it because there are a handful of them around our region that will provide services at little to no charge for infant loss, and I am forever grateful to them for that gift.
It was in this part of my scroll that I set down the tablet and caught my breath. Kayla had ordered "realistic" baby dolls, and also returned them. I had heard of women purchasing dolls like this in grief because they desperately needed to fill their aching empty arms, but again, a year later doesn't track with the typical experience. I continued to scroll, and found not just one or two dolls purchased, but at least four. One was kept.
Finally, a keeper. She finally found one that must have met the criteria because it did not show as returned. Notably the most expensive one, so if you are in the market I can maybe save you some time.
I would argue that the hair on this doll is not very realistic. Thankfully, there was a hat already purchased and ready to cover up that little issue. The doll, the hat, the urn had all been purchased to create and continue this narrative. All of these items serving as proof that Hope existed, and the grief Kayla endured was real. I sent these images on to Lindsey and Ahna who had remained steadfast alongside me in trying to uncover all of these questions. Quickly they were able to gather photos from the reviews of this specific doll and compare them to the photos Kayla had claimed were of her and Hope together.
I have got to say that it this moment I think I finally broke into a bit of laughter. It was so incredibly absurd! We were actually relieved it wasn't someone else's actual infant by that point. This was also when the other moms and I became very uncomfortable with the idea that she was still out there doing whatever she wanted. We had heard she was nannying in the Minneapolis area for families and were very concerned about our own families. As my daughter and her had become somewhat close she finally asked me why Kayla isn't around anymore. She was 7 at the time. I told her we just are not friends with her anymore, but that wasn't enough of an answer for my stubborn daughter. She continued questioning until I finally said "Kayla lied. She lied to us and now we cannot trust her anymore". I thought that would put it to rest but she kept on. She wanted to know what she had lied about that had been so bad we weren't speaking to her. Finally I settled on an answer. "She lied to us about loving Henry. She never loved him" I said. My daughter simply nodded her head once and never asked about her again. She fiercely loved her brother and still does. She has her dad's stubbornness and my softness, I guess. I wanted to be sure that if Kayla ever showed up at my home and tried to engage with my daughter in any way that she would not allow it. This person was now a stranger to us, and I hoped my daughter would react accordingly if ever approached by her. Perhaps this was overzealous, but when it comes to protecting our children, any parent will tell you they would do whatever it takes. Other parents echoed my concerns and had to have difficult conversations with their families as well.
All of this evidence was organized and given to the FPD. The investigation seemed to go on forever. Months went by with no updates, and no new information about charges or recovery of any of the organization's funds or property. In March of 2022 a local news station and reporter decided to cover the story. Kevin Wallevand had interviewed us in the past to share our stories of loss and highlight the work we were doing in the community with Hopeful Heart Project.
The story aired and finally it felt like we could breathe again. It had been tiring to hold in details of the story, and perhaps with the media involved and the public made aware something might start moving on the legal side.
A stream of well wishes came in from families, donors, and friends. All of them heartbroken by what Kayla had done, and all of them trying to sort out their own experiences and conversations with her over the years. Unfortunately, not everyone was overly supportive of the mission's need to continue in our community. Kneejerk reactions from funding organizations halted dollars into Hopeful Heart Project. Online platforms were shut down, and over the next year we saw our donor base shrink by at least 30%. It was devastating. For a small organization every donation counts. Every gift, every grant, every volunteer matters. We'd already been managing the initial loss of funds and making changes to operations, but now we had to start editing our programming as well. There were a few though that remained understanding. I had met with a funder a few months following this and talked with them about the situation. I was terrified he would shame me out of the room. But instead, he simply looked back at me and thanked me for telling him, and then told me that if I keep at it, I will get through it. He said he has been in business a very long time and that I would be the one who would be surprised by how often this kind of thing happens. He then offered to help any way he could and insisted I put him on our mailing list. I continue to reflect back on that conversation and on his kindness. He believed in us, and he saw the importance of the mission regardless of what one person did to destroy it. He was wise enough to understand the bigger picture, and I will always be thankful to him for it.
While there were those who walked briskly away from the organization there were those who stood very proudly next to us. I wish I could name each of them here, but I have a feeling they know who they are. The people in our corner who fought for this mission then, and continue to do so today.
Finally in May of 2022 we met at the Cass County offices with the investigating officer and the Cass County prosecutors. During this meeting we discussed what charges could be brought and what could not. They claimed the embezzlement was pretty straight forward, but there was absolutely nothing they could do about anything else. It is not against the law to lie. However, they would be conferring with Birch Burdick, the Cass County Prosecutor at the time, to discuss moving forward. After a few weeks they had messaged back to our lawyer indicating they would be pursuing the charges after a few follow up inquiries by the FPD quoting "not for a lack of evidence, but rather to dot our i's and cross our t's". Our lawyer commenting to us that it "is great to know that anyone that does wrongful actions cannot just buy their way out of it if it reaches the SAs office". This was a reaction to a proposal from Kayla's lawyer, off the record, that she would pay back over 60K if we did not pursue charges. This is however not the organization's decision. Frankly I was happy it wasn't our call. I was relieved she would be held accountable for what she had done. With a simple google search families would know better than to trust her with their kids, businesses would know better than to trust her with their money, and maybe her lies would finally come to an end.
We continued waiting for these formal charges to be issued, but they never came. Instead, in August of 2022 I received a phone call from an FBI agent. He wanted to meet with me to discuss Kayla Sorum and Hopeful Heart Project. The agent shared with me that the FPD had turned the case over to federal offices because they had more resources at their disposal to investigate. Especially when it came to wire fraud. At the end of the meeting, he was encouraging that their involvement would produce a stronger case and possibly a more serious punishment. Like every other part of this story, we waited again. This time, just like when the police were investigating, we were encouraged not to speak about the investigation. The claim was that it could possibly tip her off and propel her to get rid of evidence like her laptop, or cell phone. I still desperately wanted to get access to the computer files to ensure our accounting was back on track, and I wanted her to return the ashes she had photographed and sent to Lindsey and the ring because whatever was in it, certainly did not belong to Kayla. Maybe this would be what we finally needed to get this wrapped up. Maybe the wait would be worth it.
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