DNA Testing Reveals Alleged Age of Orphan Accused of Being an Adult In New Special

Grace made headlines after the family who adopted her changed her birthdate to make her substantially older, before placing her in her own apartment. The parents -- who didn't believe Natalia was actually a child and was instead a woman in her 20s out to kill them and their children -- were later arrested for neglect, but cleared of the charges.

While one of those parents, Michael Barnett, spoke out at length in the ID docuseries The Curious Case of Natalia Grace, the Ukrainian orphan herself gets the spotlight on the network's new 3-night event, "The Curious Case of Natalia Grace: Natalia Speaks."

TooFab has already screened the first five episodes of the six-part series and, in Episode 1, getting to the root of Natalia's true age is the main focus.

"All the records I have, especially the medical records, all point to me being a kid. There's a lot of people thinking, 'There is a way to tell her age, there is a way to prove it,'" she said. "I just want people to see the truth about my age."

In the hour, it's medical records from a doctor the orphan saw in 2010, just a few weeks after being adopted by the Barnetts, were shown. That doctor believed she was between 9 and 11 years of age at the time.

Other records shown were X-rays she had done by a dentist shortly after being placed with the Barnetts as well. While a neighbor interviewed for the show claimed the Barnetts told her a dentist said Natalia had all her adult teeth, a dentist examining the records said they showed she still had 12 baby teeth at the time and would have been between the ages of 6 and 9.

"This is way too many baby teeth to be an adult. You can't fake teeth coming in like this," he said. "Nothing in the x-ray we took that would show she could be anywhere near 15 years older. Wow, that seems crazy."

In the special, Grace is seen going to get DNA testing done at TruDiagnostic, using just a sample of her blood to determine her "chronological age." The tests determined she was "more closer to 22" in age, which they noted was "pretty close to what you think, you're almost 20, that's within 2 years." That age, of course, is much younger than the 34 years of age she'd be under her legally-changed birthdate.

"This one little piece of paper throws every single lie the Barnetts have said right into the trash, with a match. This is so big, this has been 12 years of just two people, lying their butts off. They ruined a kids' life," Grace said after learning the results. "They painted them as a big monster, when in reality, they were the ones. It just proves I was not lying about my age. They ignored everything that was pointing to the truth, just so they could have this stupid lie. They knew it and they still did what they did."

In order to get Grace's age changed in the first place, the report of a family physician who felt she was a "con artist" was used -- and not the dental X-rays or other medical records. In a later episode of the series, Grace insinuates the physician said that in his report because he "was a family friend" who the Barnetts had known "for years."

During a confrontation on the special between Michael and Natalia, he refused to answer any questions about re-aging her, while others in the docuseries speculate they changed the age to 22 because she was their dependent, meaning they'd be legally and financially responsible for Natalia until the age of 21.

Natalia came to the Barnetts through an adoption agency in 2010 and were told she was six at the time. They began to doubt her age and, in June 2012, Marion County Superior Court agreed to legally change the girl's birth record to indicate she was born in 1989 and not 2003. Shortly after, the Barnetts set her up with her own apartment, before they were arrested and charged for neglect in 2019.

Michael was cleared of all four neglect charges he was facing on October 27, 2022, while the charges against Kristine were dismissed in March 2023. Both Michael and Natalia appear in the ID special, sharing their differing perspectives on what went down those years ago.

The Curious Case of Natalia Grace: Natalia Speaks will premiere across three consecutive nights on ID beginning Monday, January 1, airing nightly from 9-11PM ET/PT. See more coverage below!