A newborn baby girl was handed over for adoption this summer to the founder of a pregnancy counselling agency from which the baby's mother had sought advice. The High Court, in a judgment published late on Friday, has found that the custody of the baby by the founder of the service and his wife was "at all times unlawful".
In a 32-page judgment, Ms Justice Laffoy said the man and his wife acted in a "totally inappropriate" manner in relation to the young mother.
Ms Justice Laffoy delivered her judgment on August 16th in a case taken by the Eastern Health Board against the founder of the pregnancy counselling service, his wife and the mother of the baby. The case was held in camera but Ms Justice Laffoy decided it was in the public interest that the judgment be published without the names of the parties involved. It was published late last week.
The case concerns a 21-year-old unmarried, third-level student from a provincial town who contacted the agency at the beginning of May when she was seven months pregnant after seeing its advertisement. The woman was referred to the agency's representative in her home town and was advised to make contact with a GP in Dublin recommended by the agency. She told the GP she had decided to give her baby up for adoption.
She met the founder of the agency in a Dublin city centre hotel.
Baby A was born three weeks prematurely in a hospital in the woman's home town. The mother was very distraught and distressed during her stay in the hospital.
Four days after the birth, she was discharged and went home with the baby in the company of her mother and aunt-in-law. On the same day, the mother and aunt-in-law handed the baby over to the agency's founder.
The court also heard of the case of an infant known as Baby B, born in Dublin to a 17-year-old second-level student in April. The agency's founder and his wife had custody of this baby from shortly after its birth until the end of June. Baby B was handed back to her mother after she requested custody of her child.