Renola is due to be flown out for heart surgery under the Rotary Club?s Gift of Life Program, which takes care of all her medical expenses.

Amandala first encountered the couple on Monday, December 12, 2005, when they were in the vicinity of our offices on Partridge Street soliciting donations. We invited the couple in to do an interview, but when we checked with the Hillside Health Care Center in Punta Gorda, where the couple told us the child was being treated, the doctor there told us that Rotary was taking care of all the family?s expenses.

When we asked the couple for identification, neither party could produce one. That?s when we took their photo, seen here with a baby they claim to be theirs.

At the time, we were unable to determine whether the two were actually Renola?s parents; however, Yvonne Moore of Rotary and Yvette Burks of the Belize Emergency Response Team informed us this week that the two are imposters, only posing as Renola?s real parents.

Our information is that the patient in question is the child of Carlton Gillett and Muriel Jacobs. The couple soliciting funds are the girl?s sister and brother-in-law, and relatives say that the monies the couple have collected are not being used for the purpose for which they were intended.

Even after the couple were informed in our office that there was no need to continue collecting donations, they continued to do so for over a month later.

We have obtained 4 donation slips, dated January 4, 2006, which list donations totaling nearly $1,000.

In December, the couple visited Mrs. Moore?s home in Buttonwood Bay and after further investigation, she learned that they were collecting unauthorized donations.

Mrs. Moore caught up with the couple again on Saturday, January 21, when they continued soliciting funds from people, and she confiscated their donation papers.

The paper reads: ?January 4, 2006. To whom it may concern: Renoka (sic) Gillett is a six-year-old child from Elridge Ville (sic) who will be transported to the United States for a kidney surgery. [signed] D.O (sic) Erick Suider?

We understand there the ?doctor Suider? is a concocted name, and evidently so is the signature. Also, Renola does not have a kidney condition, but a heart condition.

Rotarians fear that the impersonation of Renola?s parents could spoil the chances of people who genuinely need assistance and they urge the general public to please be on the alert for these two individuals.