Suleman misses childcare offer deadline

LOS ANGELES, Mid-Wilshire (KABC) -- Nadya Suleman was offered help to provide for her medical and emotional needs of her children. But she turned that offer down. Besides the octuplets, Suleman has six other young children.

Nadya Suleman is a single, unemployed mother of 14, including octuplets born a month ago. She's about to lose her home and does not have the financial means to care for her children. So why would she turn down a charitable offer of help?

Only Suleman knows for sure, but attorney Gloria Allred believes Suleman is more interested in profiting from her kids.

Allred wants the world to know that the woman known as "octomom" doesn't want her help. Allred represents Angels In Waiting, a nonprofit group that offered 24-hour-seven-days-a-week care for Nadya Suleman's 14 children in a home where they'd receive individualized care from professionals.

"Nadya and her parents would be welcome and the family could be together," said Allred. "Angels In Waiting would ask the public for donations and there would be no burden to the taxpayer."

After several phone conversations with Suleman, Allred and Angels In Waiting had a meeting set up with her for last Monday, but Suleman never showed.

They say Suleman seemed more interested in capitalizing on her infants than caring for them -- by asking to do a reality show -- and hold press conferences every two weeks updating the babies' conditions.

"I told her a reality show is a definite no," said Linda West Conforti, Angels In Waiting. "I educated Nadya that we would have a total of 28 people a day in our home and that her preemies are an open Petri dish due to their low immune system."

Allred says she set a deadline for Suleman to accept the offer, to give Angels In Waiting time to get their team in place and seek donations from the public, before the babies are released from the hospital. That deadline expired at midnight Thursday. Allred says she and Angels In Waiting are concerned about the protection of Suleman's children.

"We believe the next step should be that the L.A. County Department of Child and Family Services, with whom I have filed a request for an investigation, should make sure that these children are protected," said Allred.

Nadya Suleman's publicist was not available for comment. As for the octuplets, they remain hospitalized in stable condition. Doctors say they are alert, responsive, and doing well.

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