The High Court has ordered a 15-year-old girl, identified as C.B., returned to the Netherlands after she strongly objected to going back. Mr Justice Birmingham made the order on 27 July 2010 in Hague Convention proceedings brought by the Dutch Youth Care Agency (YCA), which held custody under an Amsterdam court order.
The judge said the Netherlands was C.B.’s habitual residence and that the YCA was exercising its custody rights when she was removed in July 2008. He found no basis to refuse return because of a grave risk of harm or an intolerable situation. C.B. had referred to bullying while in care, but the judge said the high threshold for that exception had not been met.
The remaining issue was C.B.’s objection to return. The judge met her in court on 22 July and described her as clear, determined and articulate. She said she did not want to return, feared losing contact with her mother, and had been bullied in a residential unit. She also said she would run away and refuse to cooperate if sent back. Her guardian reported that she wanted to remain in Ireland, resume education and attend a high-support or open residential unit.
The judgment records that C.B. had been missing since absconding from foster care in Sligo in 2008. She was found on 16 July 2010 during a Garda search of premises in Clane, County Kildare, conducted under the Misuse of Drugs Acts. The judge noted concerns about the circumstances in which she was found, including that she had been sharing a bedroom with a 21-year-old man whom she described as a friend.
The court had discretion to refuse return after considering C.B.’s views, but the judge stressed that the Convention did not give the child the decision-making power. He concluded that returning her was in her interests and consistent with the Convention’s aims, despite her strongly expressed objection.
The judgment also describes separate, more recent proceedings in which the Health Service Executive (HSE) sought orders for C.B.’s detention at Gleann Alainn Special Care Unit and related relief. The source does not specify the final disposition of those HSE applications. It records that an ex parte special-care detention order had been made earlier in July and that C.B. was placed in the unit’s education area while the main area was full.