‘Judge-made vortex of uncertainty and delay’ stalled N.S. adoption: appeal court
HALIFAX — Nova Scotia’s highest court has issued an unusually blunt rebuke to a judge who delayed an adoption hearing because of “entirely hypothetical” constitutional concerns about whether the child’s biological father had been given proper notice.
In a unanimous decision, the Nova Scotia Appeal Court says the adoptive parents of a young baby found themselves caught in a “judge-made vortex of uncertainty and delay” that stalled the adoption for almost a year at great expense and anxiety to the family.
Justice Cindy Bourgeois found that the adoptive parents “did everything right,” but suffered a patent injustice due to the hearing judge’s unfounded concerns and “intrusion” into the legislative arena.
“There was no good reason for the hearing judge to subject these would-be parents and their child to unnecessary turmoil,” she said in the decision released Wednesday, which took the extraordinary step of issuing an order for the adoption.