Bid to Adopt Baby Gets Challenge Today
Mom vanished before learning of her rights
By L.l. Brasier And Kathleen Gray, Free Press Staff Writers
Originally published in the Detroit Free Press, May 15, 2001
Everyone involved in the case of Baby Girl Brown agrees she is thriving in her new home—where she was placed in February, two days after her mother left her in a hospital under Michigan's new safe delivery laws.
And everyone agrees it was likely the mother wanted the baby adopted. She said that to hospital personnel at least three times in the hours after she gave birth, before she disappeared into the dawn.
But was the process legal?
A bevy of attorneys will be in court today, arguing thorny constitutional issues surrounding when it is proper for the state to terminate parents' rights, particularly when the parents are unknown. The rights of the natural parents must be terminated before the adoption can go forward.
The law is designed to allow desperate parents a way to leave newborns in safe places, like hospitals or police stations, without risk of being charged with neglect. But Oakland County Family Judge Patrick Brennan, in a hearing two weeks ago, openly questioned whether the law is constitutionally sound.
Baby Girl Brown was the first of five babies left so far since the new law went into effect Jan. 1. Four were taken to Oakland County hospitals and a fifth was left at a Detroit hospital Wednesday.
The judge's decision could come as early as today. While not binding on the other cases, it could make other judges reconsider the law's merits.
Brennan will hear arguments from attorneys representing the baby, the absentee mother and unknown father and Catholic Social Services, the adoption agency that placed the baby in the home and petitioned the courts to terminate the parental rights.
At issue is decades of case law that requires the state to overwhelmingly prove parents know of termination proceedings and have an opportunity to fight to keep their children. Termination takes months, sometimes years, with the court carefully monitoring the family's progress. A trial is held, with parents given the opportunity to present their cases.
In the case of a mother voluntarily giving up custody in a standard adoption proceeding, she must appear in open court and identify the father, who also must approve. If the father is unknown, she must state that.
The safe delivery law requires only published notice of proceedings to terminate parental rights in local newspapers. And it gives the parents 28 days to reconsider and retrieve the child.
The Baby Girl Brown case is further complicated because it was the first in the state under the new law, and hospital officials did not yet have the literature available to explain the law to the mother. Nor did they inform the mother of her rights to retrieve the child, as required by law. The mother left before social workers could talk to her.
Investigators later learned she had provided a false name and address. The father remains unknown.
Amy Peterman, the attorney appointed by the court to represent the child, plans to argue today that, while the letter of the law might not have been followed in this case, it still was in keeping with the intent of the legislators when they passed the law. She wants the parents' rights terminated so that the adoption can continue.
"I think we have to look at it from the child's perspective. There is no question that the child is best off remaining in the home that she is currently in," she said. "She is extremely well-provided for emotionally and physically. It is a wonderful, loving home. I think it can be argued that the statute was complied with. This mother, on three separate occasions, said she wanted this child adopted out."
Even the attorney representing the mother's interests contends her parental rights should be terminated and that the law, at least in spirit, was followed.
"Her decision to leave the hospital without waiting to be counseled by a social worker was a choice to waive any further due process," attorney Karen Gullberg Cook argues in motions filed with the court.
"Her decision to avoid the opportunity to obtain minimal legal advice should not be deemed fatal constitutional error."
Should the judge rule the law unconstitutional, prosecutors could a file a neglect petition with the juvenile court to end parental rights that way.
If the petition were granted—a likely scenario—the mother, should her name be discovered, would be placed on a central registry roster of neglectful parents, and officials would investigate any future children she might have. The girl would likely remain where she was placed shortly after birth.
"That's what we are trying to avoid with this law, the threat of a neglect proceeding," said attorney Peterman. "And we may be back to it."
Similar laws have been enacted in 28 states, said Joyce Johnson, spokeswoman for the Child Welfare League of America. But there is no central clearinghouse of data on the number of babies abandoned.
For information on the Safe Delivery program, call 866-733-7733.
