Ukrainian dwarf Natalia Grace, who some thought was an adult disguised as a six-year-old girl after being adopted by an American family, is being profiled once again as her new parental figures turn against her.
Investigation Discovery’s latest documentary, ‘The Curious Case of Natalia Grace: The Final Chapter,’ released its first trailer after Natalia’s second adoptive parents, Michael and Kristine Barnett, abandoned her in 2012.
Natalia first came to the United States in 2008 and was placed with a partner who ultimately rejected her for undisclosed reasons. In 2010, she was adopted by the Barnetts, who lived in Indiana.
Natalia was in the Barnetts’ care for two years. But soon after she joined the family, the couple claimed Natalia was a “sociopath” who threatened to kill them, stood over their beds with a knife at night and tried to poison Kristine.
They began to doubt the birth certificate that stated she was born in 2003, which would make her six years old when they adopted her. That’s because they said Natalia had grown pubic hair and had started getting her period.
The Barnetts, who have three biological children, successfully convinced a court in 2012 to legally change their date of birth to 1989, making it 22 years old. Shortly after, they moved hundreds of miles away, leaving her in an apartment they had rented for her in Lafayette, Indiana.
Natalia’s new parents became a neighbor couple, Cynthia and Antwon Mans, who discovered that she lived alone and took her in.
They once vigorously defended her and described her as a “genuine and caring young woman,” but the teaser released by ID shows Antwon telling producers, among other things: “Something’s not right with Natalia.”
Natalia Grace, pictured, will soon be in the spotlight again. She rose to fame after her second adoptive parents, Michael and Kristine Barnett, abandoned her because they claimed she was pretending to be an adult and violently threatening them.
It seems that her third adoptive parents, Cynthia and Antwon Mans, had a fight with Natalia. Investigation Discovery Documentary Series Finale Will Cover How Things Went Sour
Antwon also seemed to suggest that Natalia might have a romantic interest.
“She’s got this guy in line,” he said. He turned her against us. She’s ready to go to hell with her gas panties on.
This comes after the Mans family said they were done with Natalia in a previous documentary finale that aired in January.
These small details mirror some of the accusations leveled against Natalia by the Barnetts, who were actually charged in 2019 with abandoning and endangering a dependent.
‘Natalia was a woman. She had periods. He had permanent teeth. He never grew an inch, which would happen even to a child with dwarfism. “All the doctors confirmed that I was suffering from a serious psychological illness that is only diagnosed in adults,” Kristine Barnett insisted to DailyMail.com after being charged.
A DNA test conducted this year showed that Natalia was about 22 years old, so she was less than 10 years old when she was with the Barnetts.
Natalia has long maintained that she was just a child when the Barnetts abandoned her.
Despite this, Michael was acquitted in October 2022 and Kristine had charges dropped three weeks before her trial in March 2023.
Michael and Kristine Barnett (see) have claimed that Natalia was an adult ‘con artist’ posing as a six-year-old orphan, but she maintained that she was a child the entire time.
Antwon was the one who initially said he was done with Natalia, even though he let her live with his family for years.
Now, the trailer would suggest that Cynthia and Antwon Mans were in a similar situation as the Barnetts once were.
Or maybe not. The trailer also showed people expressing concern that the Mans family was abusing Natalia in some way.
“Cynthia and Antwon know how to silence people,” one woman said.
“Behind closed doors, there are monsters,” said one man.
“I kept telling her that you have to leave before they kill you,” another man said, apparently referring to Natalia.
“The Man are a cult,” said another person.
The Mans family began the adoption process for Natalia in 2016, which meant they would have to prove she was a minor and restore her original date of birth.
The second season of the documentary revealed that she was adopted by the Mans family in 2023.
This man claimed that the Man family are monsters
This man said he told Natalia to leave the Mans family home ‘before they kill you’
Natalia (seen with the Mans family) said she is saving up to have ‘spinal surgery’ and added that if she doesn’t get the treatment soon she could be ‘paralysed’.
But that appears to have been a temporary living situation for Natalia, who revealed that she moved in a GoFundMe she posted in January to raise money for spinal surgery.
“I recently moved and am saving money to get my own house so I can have a place of my own,” she wrote. ‘I want to start my own photography business to create a fun and amazing way to have fun and do what I love, which is taking photographs and creating memories for myself and other people!’
He also explained that the spinal surgery he wants to have is not covered by his health insurance and costs “more than $500,000.”
“I have a type of dwarfism called diastrophic dysplasia, a form of dwarfism that has many serious problems that often require surgery,” he wrote. “The first treatment I need is to have my spine corrected, because if I leave it for too long it could cause paralysis and incontinence.”
The final saga of Natalia’s story will focus on the fight between her and the Mans family that caused her to move in the first place.
‘The Curious Case of Natalia Grace: The Final Chapter’ premieres in January 2025 on ID.