September 2nd - A Ukrainian Court Experience

Laura
Sep 13, 2015
2 min read

It's taken me some time to reflect over our experience in Ukrainian court last week. There had been some delay in our court date because in Igor's orphanage town of Novomirgorod there has been ongoing political infighting and they currently don't have a functioning court. Our adoption facilitator was successful in receiving permission to have our case brought to court in the nearby town of Mala Vyska.

We arrived just in time for our court time of noon only to find that one of the volunteer jurors hadn't shown up. We had to send our hired driver to pick her up while we waited for over an hour. After court we were apparently also responsible for taking her and another juror home while we again waited for over an hour outside the court house for our driver. The court structure was to have a judge, two volunteer "jurors", and a prosecutor who would hear our petition to adopt Igor, ask questions, and then deliberate to make a decision. Igor's social worker served as the "defense" and our facilitator served to translate the proceedings for us. Igor was also accompanied by a representative from the orphanage who gave testimony to Igor's desire to be with us.

The most difficult part of the proceedings was repetitive descriptions of Igor's status. At least six times Igor was referred to as, "Igor, whose mother abandoned him". This seemed to be used as a purely factual description of the "defendant" as if there was no emotional connection with those words. I glanced over at Igor a few times when this was said and he didn't seem to visibly react, but it must tear at his emotional scars. It infuriated me and saddened me all at the same time, but the final verdict...

PARENTHOOD GRANTED TO US,

SONSHIP GRANTED TO IGOR!