Octuplets' Grandfather Says He'll Fight for Kids
Nadya's father: "I will stop anybody... from taking my grandchildren away."
March 9, 2009 — -- Ed Doud, grandfather of the famous California octuplets and father of their controversial mother, Nadya Suleman, plans to fight to make sure his family keeps the kids and said the family will not call on the taxpayers for assistance in raising them.
"I will stop anybody, I don't care who they are, from taking my grandchildren away," Doud said in an interview with "Good Morning America." "We have a loving home, loving mother and there's no way, no legal right for anybody to take my grandchildren anywhere."
The comment came after reports that the California hospital may not release the children into Suleman's care if it believes she is incapable of caring for the infants.
The state of Suleman's home environment was called into question last week when tapes of a frantic 911 call from last year were discovered in which Suleman, then pregnant with the octuplets, lost one of her other six children and threatened to kill herself.
On Friday, Suleman's publicist Victor Munoz quit representing her because, as he told UsMagazine.com, "this woman is nuts."
But Doud said that if any authority took legal action to take the children from their mother it would be "a waste of [taxpayers'] money."
"Leave them alone," he said.
The taxpayers will also not be on the hook for helping to raise the children, Doud said, despite the formidable financial challenges that raising the large family is likely to entail, including a hospital bill that could reach $1 million and the family's history of financial trouble.
"If we become well enough, we don't need anybody," Doud said. "If we struggle, just like everybody else, we will ask for help. We're not going to ask for help from taxpayers."
In February Doud asked for help from supporters when he appeared on Oprah Winfrey's show.
"You know what? She needs help. I say to everybody now, 'people, we do need help,'" Doud said then. "Do not punish my daughter for what she had done and do not punish the babies, because they were given by God."
