A British woman who deceived three couples into giving her money for her services as a surrogate was sentenced at Leeds Crown Court last week to two years in prison. Moira Greenslade pleaded guilty and was convicted in March on three counts of obtaining money by deception and three offences under the Adoption Act. The charges stemmed from the fact that, while pregnant, she 'sold' her unborn baby to two different couples, using the Internet to set up the deals, and arranged another deal in the hospital where the baby was born.

Ms Greenslade, aged 33, from West Yorkshire, appeared before Bingley Magistrates Court in March, accused of taking a total of £2,500 from two couples in September and October last year. She pleaded guilty to having deceived the couples into believing that she was continuing a surrogacy agreement separately made with each of them. It also emerged in court that she had successfully acted as a surrogate three years ago, and has donated eggs at a fertility clinic in Sheffield.

Greenslade entered a £9,000 surrogacy agreement in February 2003, with Scottish couple Mark and Michelle Johnson, who had been unsuccessful in eight attempts at IVF treatment. The couple paid her £1,500 in cash in September 2003, but Ms Greenslade cancelled the agreement little more than a week before the baby was due to be born.

She also entered a second agreement, worth £5000, with Peter and Sharon Robinson-Hudson, from Wrexham in Wales, in August 2003, when she was already pregnant. They paid her two installments of £500 each in September and October 2003, but called the police when they received an email from her cancelling the agreement. It later transpired that she had entered a further surrogacy arrangement for £8,000 with another couple, at the hospital where the child was born, after placing an advertisement on a website in October 2003.

Ms Greenslade was arrested in a Southampton hospital after giving birth to a baby girl in December last year. The baby was taken into care, where she remains. Passing sentence, Mr Justice Henriques told her that her actions undermined the role of adoption services and that she needed a punishment that would deter others. He said: 'Right-thinking members of the public will feel outrage at your cynical and callous fraud'. He added: 'Couples who desperately seek a child are frequently prepared to go to extraordinary ends to meet their ambitions. Their hopes and prayers render them vulnerable to opportunists and fraudsters such as yourself'.