Adoption of Abigail

Sixteen days after her birth on October 27, 1982, Abigail was placed with the family by which the Department of Social Services proposes she be adopted. Nobody disputes the incapacity of Abigail’s biological parents at the time of her initial placement. The question is the fitness of the biological mother 2 to be Abigail’s parent in mid-April, 1985, when the petition was heard. Abigail was then two and one-half years old; and the mother was then thirty years old. A judge of the Probate Court found the mother was not fit, and she has appealed.

Abigail suffers from a complex of neurological and…