The Roma are a people often ridiculed and referenced in legend. Most people have little-to-no experience with these people beyond knowing them as gypsies or travelers. In reality, the Roma are a people who have faced hundreds of years of persecution from nearly every government in Europe and the Middle East. Most recently, a Roma settlement in Greece is under fire for the supposed kidnapping of a young girl named Maria. However, the case isn’t clear cut.

BBC News reported that Maria was discovered during a raid on the settlement. The Greek government was searching for illegal weapons and drugs. During a search of a personal home, an investigator noticed a blond-haired child among other children with brown hair. This alone prompted the investigator to accuse the parents of the home of kidnapping, arguing the child looked nothing like them or their other children. This indeed proved to be true. DNA testing revealed that the girl was not biologically related to the parents raising her.  How did she arrive in a Roma settlement? The parents claimed that the little girl, named Maria, was given to them by a poor mother who could not afford to raise her. From birth until now, Maria has been raised in the Roma community. Other members of the community have stepped up in defense of the adoptive parents, claiming she was cared for as one of their own. 

Following Maria’s removal from the camp, there has been much debate as to what the appropriate course of action is. The parents’ story may very well be correct — and there may be no way to find the girl’s birth mother. Furthermore, DNA testing on other children living in the settlement has revealed other children are not biologically related to the parents with whom they make their home. This has revealed serious cracks in Greece’s system of child registration, which allows anyone to register a child as his or her own, granted they are backed by two witnesses. 

All of the legal jargon doesn’t account for the fact that Maria is now separated from the only parents she has ever known. While human trafficking is always a concern, it doesn’t seem to be at play in this investigation. Ultimately, this case brings to light questions about the Roma community that most do not have answers to — and demonstrates the plight of the Roma people in Europe. Almost 80 percent of the 300,000 Roma people who live outside of Athens, Greece are illiterate. Putting such an impoverished and traditionally shunned group of people at the center of a massive legal investigation is forcing Europe to re-evaluate the deep cultural divide between the Roma and the rest of the continent. 

For now, it may very well be wiser to allow Maria to go home to her parents, at least until we learn more information.