Conference turris::scandia

151.0. "Child custody in Sweden" by TLE::SAVAGE (Neil, @Spit Brook) Wed Oct 15 1986 13:17

Associated Press Tue 14-OCT-1986 21:54                        Sweden-Children

               Government Agrees to Pay Damages to Two Mothers
    
    STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) - The government has agreed to pay $28,600 each
    to two mothers who gained international attention when authorities took
    their children to foster homes, a Foreign Ministry official said
    Tuesday. The rare agreement to pay damages to the mothers was arranged
    in cooperation with the European Commission for Human Rights, said Hans
    Corell, head of the ministry's legal department. 
    
    The cases received extensive foreign news coverage in the early 1980s,
    and led to criticism of the Swedish system of compulsory commitment of
    children to public care. The mothers, Ulla Widen and Eva Aminoff,
    appealed separately to the human rights commission in Strasbourg,
    France, accusing Swedish authorities of violating human rights. 
    
    In March 1983, a regional court in Jonkoping, Sweden, decided that Ms.
    Widen's two children, aged 3 and 9, should be placed in a foster home.
    The court said "the relationship between Ms. Widen and her children is
    good ... but her apartment is very dirty," even though the social
    welfare authorities repeatedly told her to keep it clean. 
    
    The children were taken away by police and social workers. Two years
    later the regional court said her home situation had improved and
    returned them to Ms. Widen. Meanwhile, she had appealed to the European
    Commission. 
    
    Ms. Aminoff lost custody of her 10-year-old son in 1979 because, the
    regional court in Stockholm said, she "does not have insight in
    children's needs" and "is unable to give Alexander (her son) rigid
    borders for his actions." Alexander was put in a foster home. The
    authorities reportedly kept the location secret to his mother. After
    four years, the boy ran away to his mother and they moved to
    neighboring Finland. Meanwhile, she also appealed to the commission. 
    
    Corell said the mothers would be given 200,000 kronor ($28,600) each,
    an exceptionally high damage payment by Swedish standards. The
    agreement was accepted by the mothers' lawyers, the Swedish government
    and the commission on Oct. 10, Corell said. 
    
    In 1983, several media reports from abroad described cases of arbitrary
    decisions and record-high numbers of parents losing custody in Sweden.
    The reports prompted the Foreign Ministry to invite the foreign
    correspondents to a "briefing." However, the meeting ended in boos from
    some of the 150 journalists after they had been given lectures about
    Sweden's child welfare laws by a panel of experts and were accused of
    giving misleading information in their reports.