I want my daughter, I'm suffering like an animal: Forced caesarean mother speaks out as council bids to gag Press

A mother whose baby was taken after a forced caesarean broke her silence over her ordeal yesterday – as the council involved made an extraordinary bid to gag the Press.
Essex County Council demanded restrictions on Press coverage after the mother whose child was put up for adoption by its social workers said she had been treated ‘like an animal’.
The 35-year-old Italian woman, who suffers from a mental illness, described her horror after her baby daughter was taken from her womb without her knowledge or consent.

The newborn was taken into state care on the orders of a judge in the notoriously secretive Court of Protection, despite the mother's pleas to be allowed to raise her. File picture

She said nobody had even told her she was having the procedure until she woke up and found that her baby had been removed.
And she said she has now been banned from seeing her baby for five months by social workers who ignored her desperate pleas for the child to be returned.
The air hostess said: ‘I was sedated and deceived to give birth - that's how they took my daughter. I want my daughter back - I am suffering like an animal.
'They forced me to have a Caesarean without telling me anything.
'The day of the birth I thought they were just moving me from one room to another - I was telling them I wanted to go back to Italy. Then I was sedated. Then when I woke up she wasn't with me. They took her away from me.'

The woman, who is from central Italy, has started legal proceedings to try and get her daughter back from Essex County Council and has hired lawyers in Rome, specialised in international family matters, to help fight her case.
She added: 'The Caesarean was forced upon me, I wasn't even told about it. I did not give my consent either verbally or written, for my child to be adopted.
'The baby's natural father and an American relative were both happy to take care of her but the English social services ignored me. Why? Why did nobody help me ?'
She spoke amid growing international outrage over her enforced caesarean, which took place on the orders of the Court of Protection.
The court has not revealed its reasons for the ruling.
Italian campaigners said it was ‘utterly incomprehensible’ that British courts had apparently sanctioned such a ‘brutal violation of human rights.’ And the mother’s lawyers likened her treatment to life in Nazi Germany or North Korea.
But within hours of the woman speaking out about her treatment, Essex County Council demanded harsh new restrictions on the Press’s ability to report her case ‘to preserve the privacy of this baby’s family life’.

Birmingham Yardley MP John Hemming is a long-standing campaigner against court secrecy

John Hemming, a Liberal Democrat MP who has campaigned for open justice, said it was ‘absurd’ to gag reporting of the case.
‘The only thing this does is to protect those who make erroneous decisions. It appears Essex children’s services are now so worried about the exposure of what they have been doing that they are now trying to silence the judiciary.’
The shocking case has highlighted concerns about secret rulings in Britain’s courts. The woman travelled to Britain last year for an airline training programme at Stansted Airport in Essex.
The mother-of-three suffers from a bipolar condition and has a long history of psychiatric treatment and has to take medication to control manic episodes and paranoid delusions.
She had apparently stopped taking her medication and called police after suffering a panic attack, saying she could not find her children’s passports in her hotel room.
She was taken to hospital, where she was sectioned under the Mental Health Act.
The pregnant woman was kept in hospital for five weeks before the health trust applied for permission to deliver her unborn child by caesarean, saying it had concerns about risks to the mother and child.
A judge in the highly secretive Court of Protection, which makes decisions for incapacitated people, ruled in August 2012 she should undergo the forced caesarean.
Essex County Council was given a court order to take the baby into care, saying her mother was too unwell to look after her, and the woman was sent home to Italy.
The council then asked the courts to allow it to put the baby up for adoption. At an adoption hearing earlier this year, the woman begged not to be separated from her daughter, and for her family to be allowed to raise the girl, who is now 15 months old.
Her two elder daughters, aged 11 and four, are raised by their maternal grandmother.
Judge Roderick Newton ruled it was in the child’s best interests to approve her adoption.
The woman has not seen her child since July after Essex social services said she had been adopted but her lawyers Stefano Oliva and Luana Izzo are trying to get her child back to her through the court system. 
Speaking from Rome Mr Oliva said: 'It sounds like something from a Hitler regime. We have been in touch with the Italian Ministry of Justice and we are also pursuing a legal path in England.
'We have been representing the client since the start of 2013, when an American aunt of the second child offered to adopt both children and take them to Los Angeles.
'A short while later we discovered the existence of the third child and the American aunt was happy to adopt her as well so we started proceedings for all of them, even the one with the British social services but that was rejected.'
Mr Oliva added: 'She recalls telling everyone that she was fine and she had no reason to go to hospital but the situation became even more tragic and she ended up in an operating theatre where she had a Caesarean which had been ordered.
'She kept telling them "Where are you taking me? I want to give birth in Italy". The other thing is that she speaks excellent English so it is impossible to think there was a communication problem.
'The baby was born and in February 2013 she was adopted, despite the opposition of the mother and despite the fact that doctors say she should not be separated from the child.
'The baby has been registered with the name of the lady's first partner and not that of the real father, who has also contacted the authorities in England and offered to take care of the child.
'It is an inconceivable decision because all European legislation guarantees the integrity of the family group - the only exception is where a child has been abandoned and this is not the case here.'
Last night an Italian Foreign Ministry spokesman said: 'We are aware of this woman's case and the consulate in London is monitoring the situation. It's very complicated and involves both the Italian and British legal system and the situation is ongoing so it would not be right to say anything else. The consulate in London is doing what it needs to do.'

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Britain's top family judge has demanded social workers who made the decision to force the woman to give up her baby must explain themselves.
In a highly unusual intervention, Sir James Munby has demanded to know why the girl should not be reunited with her mother.
Fabio Roia, the most senior judge in Milan, said the woman’s treatment by a secret court resembled a horror film – an unprecedented ‘act of extreme violence’ that could not have happened in Italy.
The mother, who was suffering from a mental illness, was subjected to a caesarean on the orders of the controversial Court of Protection.
Her ex-husband and her parents, who look after her two other children, insisted they would care for the girl. But, in a second secret hearing, a court ruled that her girl should be removed from her care for adoption by a British family.
Campaigners said it was wrong for a closed-doors court to force a foreign citizen to have an invasive medical procedure and seize her child against her will.
The extraordinary case will lead to growing calls for the courts involved in the case to be opened to public scrutiny. There was also intense criticism of the children’s services officials in Essex.
Shami Chakrabarti, of the Liberty pressure group, said: ‘At first blush this is dystopian science fiction unworthy of a democracy like ours. Forced surgery and separation of mother and infant is the stuff of nightmares that those responsible will struggle to defend in courts of law and decency.’
Bipolar UK, the charity that helps people with the illness affecting the mother, condemned the decision by a Court of Protection judge. ‘The forced caesarean and continued separation of mother and child is, we believe, unprecedented,’ it said.
‘But officials should make every effort to consult with the family before decisions are taken.’

'I was sedated and deceived to give birth - that's how they took my daughter. They forced me to have an Caesarean without telling me anything. I woke up she wasn't with me'

35-year-old mother, who cannot be named for legal reasons

The woman arrived in England last summer, while pregnant, for a training course at Stansted airport. During her stay she suffered an episode of ill health, and was sectioned.
A judge in the Court of Protection, the routinely secretive court that makes decisions for incapacitated people, ruled in August 2012 that she should undergo the forced caesarean.
County court judges, again in secret hearings, backed social workers who immediately took the mother’s newborn into care.

At a county court hearing in Chelmsford in February this year Judge Roderick Newton heard the mother beg that she should not lose her child for ever.
The judge ruled the girl should be placed for adoption – even though he accepted that the mother was well, successfully taking medication and had a job.
He said the mother might stop taking her drugs and the family offers were ‘not a starter’.
Sir James Munby, who is the President of the Family Division of the High Court, ordered that further moves towards adoption must be heard before him in the High Court.
Sir James, who took over the family courts in January, has made a series of judgments and speeches demanding greater openness in family hearings and in the Court of Protection.
He has said family hearings should be held in public, that social workers should be named in court, and that families who feel wronged should be able to speak out publicly.
John Hemming, the Lib Dem MP who has campaigned for open justice, said: ‘I welcome the transfer of the case from Chelmsford County Court to the High Court in front of the President of the Family Division. The appointment is a very positive step.’
The case has amazed Italian experts. Ernesto Caffo, of the charity Telefono Azzuro, said: ‘It is a story that defies all logic.
‘Mental illness requires special care in a delicate period such as pregnancy. But women who suffer from it generally carry their child full term and are then, if necessary, given support in their role as parents.’
In a statement, Essex children’s services said a health trust had applied for the forced caesarean after telling social workers it had concerns over risks to the health of mother and baby. It said Italian courts had been made aware of the case and ‘social workers liaised extensively with the extended family'.

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