Legal Question in Family Law in Iowa

My husband and I have been foster parents for 6 years. We take teenage girls. In November 2008 we adopted two girls that had been our previous foster children. One was age 17 the other 20.
At the time we were in the process of adoption we had serious problems with the 17 year old. She started hanging out with her bio mom and getting into trouble, her grades plummeted, etc... She did it all behind our backs and when we found out we put the adoption on hold as suggested by the lawyer. She was in mental health counseling and we kept in contact with her counselor. The DHS worker really wanted us to adopt this girl as they had her adopted for 8 years previous and it was a failure. The DHS worker wanted to retire but also felt some obligation to right the situation for this girl. The adoption stayed on the docket of the court. When the time drew closer, we talked with as many experts as possible involved with this our foster daughter to try and figure out whether we should adopt her or not. Supposedly she was remorseful of her behavior, she loved us and this was where she wanted to be, etc...
We adopted both girls in November 2008 although there were always nagging questions.
On November 12, 2009 she turned 18 and chose to leave our home and go live with a friend. That did not work out and she has been shuffling through people and eventually ended up back with her bio mom.
The question posed to her is why go through with the adoption when she could have stayed with us in foster care and left at age 18 ? She cannot answer that. She does not want us to have access to information on school, etc... She does not want communication. She went to the police and told them we stole her car. In actuality we have it because she owed us 600.00 in repairs, which we wrote off but she did not get the car insured. It also has an expired license/tags on it. The police said it made perfect sense to them. She gets insurance and she gets the car. The real problem however is that her bio family are known drug dealers and involved in other illegal activity.
She is very much fallen into the thick of it.
Although we love her and want the best for her we also need to be realistic and she has made it clear she does not want us in her life. We are also taking responsibility for a toddler and need to protect ourselves and our meager assets to raise him.
Our question to you is can the adoption be undone if she agrees to it and/or how we can protect ourselves from her actions? What are our obligations to her when she is 18 and chose to leave our home. She does not graduate until May/June 2010 if she even stays in school.
Thank you for any help you can offer.
G. and R. Williams

Asked on 1/11/10, 3:24 pm

Robert Luedeman solo practitioner

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She is legally emancipated on turning 18. You no longer have any responsibility for her upkeep and maintenance.

Answered on 1/16/10, 5:30 pm

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