Petitioning the Court

Petitioning the court is sometimes necessary to obtain access to adoption records. Here are some details to keep in mind about petitioning the court:

 Petitioning the court for adoption records is required in many states in the U.S. as the only avenue to obtain copies of those records.

 Even though there are services that will petition the courts in some states for a fee, it is generally not necessary to use a service or an attorney to to obtain adoption records.

 When I first heard a few years ago about petitioning the court, few people seemed to be having success with obtaining their records. In the last couple of years, I hear more people being successful in obtaining their records.

 If you decide to try a petition to obtain your records, you may find some useful information from a local adoption support group. Some of their members may be able to provide some useful tips.

 The procedures to petition the court to release adoption records vary from state to state. In some states, each county may have different policies or guidelines to petition the court.

 Call the clerk in the court that you will be submitting your petition. Ask her/him if there is a specific Judge who handles the petitions to open records. Some clerks are more helpful than others. I spoke to one clerk in one county in my state that provided me with a great deal of useful information about petitioning the court for records. In a different county, the clerk was very rude and unhelpful.

 Be aware that some of the information on the records that you receive if your petition is granted may still be blacked out.

 Try to include court case cites that support whatever grounds you are using to obtain your records. There are several cites that are commonly used that could be persuasive.

Here are some links that may be useful if you need to petition the court:

http://library.adoption.com/Laws-Legal-Issues/Petitioning-the-Court-to-Open-Your-Adoption-File/article/844/1.html

http://www.adoptionsearchbureau.com/petitioningcourt-FOIA.html

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/monique.jones/adoptee/DCpetition.html