A former Co. Tipperary woman, Ms Helen Maguire, aged 71 and Mrs Christine Skipsey aged 52; women at the centre of a baby mix-up, are now to seek High Court approval to bring a lawsuit against the former Sisters of Charity adoption society, previously known as St. Patrick’s Guild in Temple Hill, Blackrock, Co. Dublin.
We understand Ms Maguire, a single mother, had her baby in London in 1966 and back then wished to keep her baby’s birth a secret from her immediate family. Ms Maguire, briefly placed her new born baby for safekeeping with the Sisters of Charity, in order to make a brief return visit home to her family in December of that same year.
Seeking somewhere to leave her daughter for safekeeping for some 6 weeks, she, on the advice of Fr. Michael Cleary (The “Singing Priest”), choose the Roman Catholic adoption society at Blackrock, in Co. Dublin, for that purpose.
Details of this story were first revealed back in June by the online newspaper Independent.ie
DNA tests, later conducted, revealed and confirmed, with 99.9% certainty, that Mrs Skipsey; the baby then returned to Ms Maguire, was indeed not the biological daughter of its mother.
The women are now seeking an apology from the Religious Sisters of Charity, which ran the adoption society in Blackrock, Co. Dublin, together with the Irish State; due to the perceived alleged failure by An Bord Uchtála, latter the former Irish adoption board then appointed by the Government.
Mrs Christine Skipsey now lives in Hertfordshire, north London, with her husband, while it is believed that the biological daughter of Ms Maguire was adopted by a married couple, then residing in Dublin.
Currently, it remains unclear to both women whether this mother / baby mix-up was deliberate or an honest mistake, however their search for the truth is expected to be greatly impeded by the fact that the Religious Sisters who were then involved, are no longer in the land of the living.
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