Update on Judge Assignment

Dear Charisa,

We did receive a little news from VCT about a court date. Mary Paul personally visted the judge. Here is the info as we received it from VCT; please disregard the formatting and spelling issues:

“From: VCT
Sent: Tuesday, March 29, 2011 4:02 AM
To: Dean Hale
Subject: Re: Hanna/Susfahl

Dean,
I did request the judge to advance the case. He was not very friendly at first and talked about the pending cases for "Custody" which he had to complete in 2 weeks. Schools close for summer and this is the time parents ask for visiting rights etc.(divorce cases)

I do feel they are very ignorant about GAWA cases although they are given a handbook on adoption. I had to assure him that there were no respondents in this case and he could pass the order once the scrutiny had filed in their reports.

He seems to understand and has asked Ruth to file for an advancement of the case for the 13th of April. We will have to push for orders before vacation.

mary paul” --end of VCT update

“GAWA” stands for Guardianship and Wards Act which is the law under which foreign adoption cases are filed in the Bangalore courts. These are guardianship cases. We have asked VCT to let us know asap if the hearing does get set for the 13th. After that, we will have to see if it gets through before the Summer Recess which is from 23 April to 23 May.

Thanks,
Mary Reynolds, India Program