Linda Gunn-Russo v Nugent Care Society and Department of Health Administrative Court, Royal Courts of Justice, by Mr Justice Scott Baker

A High Court judge today (20th July) ruled that an adoption agency must reconsider its refusal to disclose some adoption files to a woman adopted in the early 1950s.

In a landmark ruling that could have a major influence on adoption agencies' policies, Mr Justice Scott Baker ruled that Nugent Care Society must review, document by document, their refusal to disclose information to Ms Linda Gunn-Russo that related to her adoptive and birth parents. Nugent had previously refused to disclose parts of her files.

After the judgement, Linda Gunn-Russo said: "I'm still trying to take it all in. I'm excited: hopefully it'll open files up for people all over the country. We won't have to sit back and take no for an answer when we ask about our parents and our early lives. It's about our personal identification".

Joanne Sawyer, the Liberty legal officer who took Linda's case, said: "It's an important verdict for Linda and for many more people who want to find out about their early lives before adoption. We hope it will strengthen the general principle of people's rights to know and will encourage adoption agencies to consider each person's circumstances individually".

BACKGROUND: Linda Gunn-Russo was placed with an adoptive family aged 15 months in the late 1940s, after a short spell in an orphanage. She lives, as she always has, in Liverpool. Now aged 54, she has sought to find out more about her past. But nearly 50 years on, some key details are still being withheld.

Both her birth parents and her adoptive parents have died. All surviving family members - of both families - are supportive of Linda's quest for information. She has been seeking access of her complete files regarding her adoption, and access to relevant information regarding her childhood, on the files of her deceased birth parents and adoptive parents. Nugent Care Society, the Catholic-run children's society that arranged her adoption, says its policy is not to disclose anyone's documents to a third party.

Extraordinarily, that means Linda cannot see parts of Nugent Care Society's files on her birth parents or adoptive parents - even though she is the reason those files exist. We contended that Linda has a right to the information being held by Nugent Care Society in those files. The records withheld from her by Nugent Care Society are fundamental to her efforts to form a full sense of her personal identity. Proceedings were issued against the Nugent Care Society and the Department of Health on 29th November 2000. This case was heard in the Administrative Court on 9th and 10th May 2001.

Joanne Sawyer, the Liberty legal officer who has taken Linda's case, says that "because of the particular circumstances at the time that Linda was adopted, there isn't as much information available as one would expect to see for children who are adopted now, but any information there is, she should have".

If Linda was adopted today, a life-story book would be created for her - but nothing like that happened in the early 1950s. The daughter of an American serviceman and a local woman, she was one of hundreds of very young children handed over to orphanages around that time. She says: "I agree that a child should have a life-story book, to help them understand where they come from. All I'm doing is trying to create my own".