A Lengthy Island man was switched at beginning with a child born minutes aside who had his similar final title — and solely realized the terrible fact by way of ancestry.com, he advised The Submit in heartbreaking element.
Kevin McMahon, 64, who’s suing Jamaica Hospital in Queens over the alleged screw-up that occurred Might 26, 1960, stated DNA checks confirmed his painful nagging suspicion that he wasn’t his dad and mom’ organic son.
“It was just like the lacking piece within the jigsaw puzzle,” stated McMahon, who works in telecommunications and was raised in Richmond Hill, Queens. “[It] defined every little thing about why my childhood was the best way that it was.”
McMahon stated he grew up stricken by some relations as a result of they suspected he wasn’t a blood relative.
The Selden man lastly realized the devastating fact in 2020 when the lady he knew as his sister, Carol Vignola, 66, submitted her DNA to the genetic database ancestry.com and found she had a organic brother she was unaware of, based on Kevin’s lawsuit filed in Queens Civil Courtroom in November 2021.
The opposite man was named Ross McMahon, and he had been born 45 minutes aside from Kevin on the similar hospital, based on court docket papers.
The infants got consecutive birth-certificate numbers, each tagged “Child McMahon” — after which allegedly handed to the flawed dad and mom.
The DNA outcomes confirmed Vignola’s longtime intestine feeling that Kevin wasn’t associated to her, partly due to his darker eyes and complexion.
She took the information to Kevin, and he was rocked by disbelief and grief, having suffered by way of a tormented childhood.
“[It was] like a shock response. I actually couldn’t come to phrases with the data,” Kevin stated.
“For a very long time, I’m like, I’m probably not Kevin McMahon. I’m actually Ross McMahon,” he stated. “I assumed to myself, ‘I’m no person … I don’t exist.’
“It’s simply exhausting to cope with, simply exhausting,” he stated.
In January 2021, Kevin took his personal ancestry.com check and obtained the outcomes confirming he was not in actual fact genetically associated to the household that raised him.
He additionally realized he had his personal organic brother named Keith McMahon, based on the swimsuit.
The 2 units of organic siblings — Vignola and Ross, in addition to Kevin and Keith — later took further blood checks to show that they had been undoubtedly a match to one another, the swimsuit stated.
Kevin stated that wanting again, the lady he knew as his paternal grandmother and the person he known as Dad had lengthy suspected he wasn’t associated to them — and handled him like a loathed outsider.
“My grandmother, my father’s mom, doted on Carol and my youthful brother Donald and my older brother Raymond. However she appeared to hate me,” McMahon stated, his eyes welling up with tears. “She believed that I used to be not my father’s baby, and she or he was right.
“[It] made me really feel nugatory. It destroyed my confidence,” he stated.
His grandma assumed his mom had cheated on his father as a result of Kevin’s look was so completely different, Kevin stated. He had olive pores and skin and brown eyes whereas a lot of the remainder of the household had blue eyes, truthful pores and skin and freckles.
“I had sure interactions with my grandmother that had been abusive, bodily abusive, and I realized to concern her and simply avoid her, actually, to remain out of arm’s attain,” McMahon advised The Submit of his late grandma.
He stated he didn’t really feel linked to his dad, both.
“I feared my father. I obtained hit rather a lot once I was a child from my father, I didn’t sit up for him coming residence,” he stated. “I simply thought my father didn’t actually take care of me.”
“I bear in mind my father being affectionate and playful with my youthful brother and me attempting to get in on that and my father simply – not being imply to me — however simply type of protecting me at arm’s distance,” he stated.
Each units of oldsters concerned within the alleged horror swap at the moment are useless.
Kevin acknowledged that he harbors “a bit of little bit of jealousy’’ towards Ross as a result of he “was the firstborn baby to my [biological] dad and mom, they usually didn’t query whether or not he was their baby.
“They doted on him,” Kevin stated. “My buddy Keith tells me that my [biological] paternal father was Ross’s greatest fan, that he supported him, all the time had his again, was all the time there. I’d have liked to have that.”
Neither Ross nor Keith nor others concerned within the scenario needed to speak to The Submit.
Vignola stated she first began questioning if McMahon was truly her organic brother when she was round 7.
“He was laying on his bunk mattress with no shirt on,” she recalled. “I used to be in all probability 7, and I used to be him, I stated, ‘Kevin, you got here from the milkman.’
“And I turned to my mom and stated, ‘Mommy? Why doesn’t he appear like us?’ ” she stated.
Her mother snapped again, “Don’t you ever communicate like that, Carol. That’s your brother,” based on Vignola.
McMahon now desires the hospital to confess it made a mistake by putting him with the flawed household.
“It makes them appear chilly and heartless that they’re not even coming throughout and acknowledging that this happened,” he stated.
The lawsuit additionally seeks unspecified monetary damages.
McMahon’s lawyer, Jeremy Schiowitz, stated the hospital didn’t “double-check its procedures.
“This wasn’t a fluke. This was a preventable tragedy,” stated Schiowitz of the agency Isaacson, Schiowitz & Korson.
“With the rise of DNA testing, we’re going to see extra of those tales come to mild,” the lawyer stated. “Kevin’s simply occurs to be one of many first.”
Jamaica Hospital didn’t return a request for remark.
— Further reporting by Natalie O’Neill
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