Browse adoption cases: page 2

Gunn-Russo v Nugent Care Society

2001 · England and Wales

An adopted adult challenged an adoption agency's refusal to disclose parts of her file. The dispute concerned how the agency should weigh promises or expectations of confidentiality against her interest in learning about her own history. The database currently draws on the later court's account in Re X, rather than a full review of the original judgment.

H v An Adoption Agency (Declarations of Parentage Following Adoption)

2021 · England and Wales

A birth father asked the court to make a declaration formally recognising his parentage after his child had been adopted. The case involved two separate questions: whether the court had power to consider such an application at all, and whether it should grant the declaration in this particular situation. Two linked judgments address those stages.

Hand v George

2017 · England and Wales

Two adopted adults challenged their exclusion from a share of a family trust created by an old will. The dispute arose within their adoptive family and concerned how older inheritance rules treated adopted grandchildren. They asked the court to recognise their entitlement rather than exclude them because they were adopted.

In Re B (A Minor)

1999 · England and Wales

A Jamaican child living with her British grandparents was the subject of an adoption application. Adoption would give her British citizenship and a right to live in the UK. The Home Secretary opposed the application because immigration consequences were a central part of the case. The dispute concerned how those consequences should be weighed alongside the child's circumstances and the proposed transfer of parental responsibility.

In the matter of X and Y (Children: Adoption Order: Setting Aside)

2026 · England and Wales

X and Y were adopted as children and later returned to live with members of their original family. Their adoptive mother supported an application to end the adoption orders so that their legal position could reflect their family lives. The case reached the Supreme Court with X and Y themselves participating. The central question was whether a court could cancel a valid adoption order because of what had happened since it was made.

L (A Child: Step-Parent Adoption)

2021 · England and Wales

A birth father appealed against an order allowing his child to be adopted by the child's stepfather. The case concerned the legal effects of stepparent adoption and the place of the child's relationship and contact with the other birth parent. It involved a family arrangement different from adoption following placement with unrelated adopters.

M (A Child: Adoption: Duty of Disclosure)

2026 · England and Wales

An adoption order was challenged after information about adult relationships in the prospective adoptive household proved inaccurate. The court had made a decision about the child's future on a materially misleading picture of the proposed home. The appeal concerned the reliability of the information available when the order was made, rather than simply a later change of mind about the adoption.

N (A Child: Placement Order: Proportionality)

2025 · England and Wales

A mother appealed against care and placement orders for her young son. Those orders had authorised his removal and placement for adoption. By the time the appeal was decided, mother and child had spent around three months apart without contact, making the practical consequences of the original decision part of the problem the appeal court had to address.

P., C. and S. v United Kingdom

2002 · England and Wales

A baby was removed at birth in England, and subsequent care and adoption proceedings led to a complaint by the family to the European Court of Human Rights. The case examined both the immediate removal and whether the parents had been able to participate fairly in proceedings with potentially permanent consequences for their relationship with their child.

PK v Mr & Mrs K

2015 · England and Wales

A 14-year-old adopted person applied in her own name to end the adoption order made when she was nearly four. She also wanted to use her biological mother's surname. The application placed the young person's own wishes about family and identity at the centre of the proceedings, rather than treating her solely as the subject of an application brought by adults.

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