Bill Seeks to Put Custody ‘Finality’ Into Independent Adoption Laws : Regulations: Sen. Marian Bergeson’s measure would cut in half the maximum time that birth mothers would have for changing their minds.

Hoping to close what has become a Pandora’s box for some adoptive parents, Sen. Marian Bergeson and several county couples rallied Tuesday behind a bill that would give birth mothers less time to change their minds about giving their children up for independent adoption.

Bergeson (R-Newport Beach) said the shorter time frame for reconsideration, along with requirements that birth mothers be officially notified of their rights during the privately arranged adoptions, is aimed at fixing ambiguities in the current law that have spawned several highly publicized and gut-wrenching custody fights over adopted children.

“We’re trying to set up a process where there is a closure, a finality,” Bergeson said about her bill, which was scheduled for its first hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee late Tuesday night.

Committee members passed Bergeson’s bill 6 to 4.

Bergeson’s measure would cut in half the maximum time that birth mothers would have for changing their minds. Current law gives them up to six months to reconsider after the birth; Bergeson’s bill would shorten that to 90 days.

If the birth mother files an objection during the allotted time, the bill would require her to make a court appearance within 10 days to sustain her claim to custody. Failure to make the court date would nullify any objection.

In addition, a birth mother’s silence during the 90-day period would be considered implied consent to the adoption.

Bergeson’s bill would also require each birth mother to be notified in writing of her rights, including the right to three counseling sessions to help her make a final decision.

Bergeson said she decided to introduce the bill because of “gross inadequacies” in laws recently interpreted by the courts to make three county couples return adopted baby boys to their birth mothers--including one mother who has since been declared unfit and forced to surrender her child to foster care.

Before Tuesday’s legislative hearing, one of the adoptive mothers--Bridget Wikidal of San Juan Capistrano--said the Bergeson bill goes deeper than legal wrangling over custody battles.

“This is a family issue,” said Wikidal, who was forced by the 4th District Court of Appeal last summer to return her 18-month-old son, Erik, to his teen-age mother in San Diego. “These children are the issue.

“I can’t tell you what it was like to lose a son,” she said, tearfully. “The issue is our son because he’s been traumatized for life.”

Wikidal’s protracted legal fight to keep Erik helped underscore the heartache of contested independent adoptions and inspired her to form Families for Adoption Reform and Children’s Rights. Wikidal and her Orange County-based group approached Bergeson earlier this year about introducing the bill.

Their aim is to clear up what they say are murky laws about independent adoptions, more than 3,300 of which were granted in California during fiscal 1990, according to state statistics.

Such adoptions usually grow out of informal agreements between a birth mother and the prospective adoptive parents and their attorney. The accords are legally consummated after the birth mother signs a consent form registered with the court.

Sometimes the birth mother simply disappears before she signs the consent form. Adoptive parents are then forced to wait six months before asking the court to declare the child “abandoned” and give them legal custody, lawyers said.

While the overwhelming majority of independent adoptions go smoothly, about 4% are reversed when birth mothers change their minds within the six months and ask for their children back, according to state statistics.

Of those, 21 cases were contested in court last year by the adoptive parents and three--involving the Wikidals and two other county couples--reached the 4th District Court of Appeal last year.

In separate decisions, the appellate court sided with the birth mothers, ruling that they had undeniable rights to the children if they objected to the adoption within six months from the births. The justices said this right superseded any lower court rulings that the children’s well-being would be best served by staying with adoptive parents.

As a result, the court sent “Timothy W,” a 15-month-old boy living with Bob and Marci Stiglitz of Huntington Beach, back to his teen-age mother in San Diego. Within five months, the boy was back in state custody after allegations that he had been abused by his mother’s boyfriend.

The court took 17-month-old “Baby Boy B” from Bradley and Kathleen Bunnell of Stanton and placed him with his birth mother--even though four of her other children have been placed in foster homes. Within five months, the woman was declared unfit, and Baby Boy B was placed in foster care.

And in what is known as the “Baby Boy M” case, the court took Erik from the Wikidals and gave him back to his natural mother, who reportedly lives elsewhere in Orange County.

In making its decision, the appellate court scolded the Wikidals for compounding their emotional tragedy with a court fight. The Wikidals should have given Erik back to his teen-age mother as soon as she changed her mind a few days before the six-month deadline, the court ruled.

But Cynthia Martin, a retired psychologist supporting the Bergeson bill, said Tuesday that even the six-month deadline invoked by the court would pose a problem for infants, who begin bonding with their adoptive parents at about four months. She said the 90 days provided in the Bergeson bill would minimize emotional damage to the child if he is returned to a birth mother.

Martin also said the bill would actually help birth mothers by forcing them to “focus” on the decision over adoption instead of giving them the legal power to drag it out and agonize for months, even years.

“I’ve never had a birth mother who was not able to make a decision within that period, 90 days,” said Martin, who now lives in Washington state, “and I’ve counseled nearly 700 birth mothers.

“This allows her to know when the decision must be made, focus on the decision and go on with her life,” Martin said. “They’re women, by and large, who want to go on with their lives.”