Texas Attorney General Opinion: DM-500 Page: 2 of 9
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The Honorable Toby Goodman - Page 2
(2) a prospective adoptive parent who identifies a parent and receives
placement of a child for adoption without the assistance of the
professional.
(c) An offense under this section is a Class B misdemeanor.2
Nothing in section 162.025 prohibits, however, a parent and a prospective adoptive parent from
identifying each other and arranging an adoption without the assistance of a licensed intermediary.
Section 25.09, Penal Code, makes it a crime for a person to advertise that the person will
place, provide, or obtain a child for adoption. Only a licensed child-placing agency is expressly
excepted from this prohibition, as follows:
(a) A person commits an offense if the person advertises in the public
media that the person will place a child for adoption or will provide or obtain
a child for adoption.
(b) This section does not apply to a licensed child-placing agency that is
identified in the advertisement as a licensed child-placing agency.
(c) An offense under this section is a Class A misdemeanor unless the
person has been convicted previously under this section, in which event the
offense is a felony of the third degree.
(d) In this section:
(1) "Child" has the meaning assigned by Section 101.003, Family
Code.4
2Fam. Code 162.025.
3We do not consider whether this statute violates the free speech protections of the First Amendment of the
United States Constitution or article I, section 8, of the Texas Constitution.
4Section 101.003, Family Code, defines "child" as "a person under 18 years of age who is not and has not been
married or who has not had the disabilities of minority removed for general purposes."p. 2865
(DM-500)
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Texas. Attorney-General's Office. Texas Attorney General Opinion: DM-500, text, December 29, 1998; (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth274309/m1/2/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.