Good parents who were prepared to get bad

Gabriel listened to the sound of the telephone ringing in the living room, but didn't dare pick it up. As he set about hurriedly packing suitcases, his wife Bárbara got the little girl's clothes together. That night they hit the road in search of a hideout where nobody could find them. By that time, the police already had a court order to enter their house and take the orphan girl who the couple had taken in a year before, at first for just a month. The guardianship committee, which was looking for other parents for the child, was demanding they give her back as soon as possible.

The couple's brave stand ended this month when a judge finally agreed to let them adopt the girl, whose mother died in 2009.

Madrid authorities say the foster couple are too old - he is 50 and she is 46

"We had to flee like criminals to stop them from taking her away"

It is not the first time that a judicial decision has conflicted with the view taken by Madrid's child guardianship committee, which considers in this case that Gabriel and Bárbara met the requirements to foster the girl for a period, but not for good. The Madrid Institute for Minors (IMMF) says they are too old - he is 50 and she is 46 - and also notes that Bárbara suffers from multiple sclerosis.

However, after battling the regional administration day and night for a year, they have been told they are right. IMMF manager Paloma Martín says the body does not share the decision but it will not appeal the sentence so as not to drag out the process any longer.

Bárbara and Gabriel say the idea of having children together never entered their minds. On occasions they fostered youngsters from dysfunctional family backgrounds on a temporary basis and in 2009 became responsible for "Lucía" - as we'll call the little girl. At the time the authorities were looking for her supposed dad, an Italian citizen the girl's biological mother had identified as the father before she died. But after being contacted by Italian social services, the man said he didn't want to take a paternity test and in any case, was not in a position to take care of Lucía. As this dragged out over a year, she remained with the couple in their house in a small Madrid town.

Lucia, who is now three and a half, made a normal life for herself with the couple during this period. Reports contributed by the pair at the time bear witness to her physical and mental progress. In the end the supposed father washed his hands of the process and the guardianship commission put Lucía on a list of children up for adoption. The couple, convinced the best thing for her would be to go on living with them, put themselves forward as adoptive parents. "Who better than us?" they asked.

Despite recognizing that the girl's situation with her foster parents was ideal in several reports, the IMMF decided to include her on the adoption list. "We would prefer a younger couple and without medical problems," says Martín.

Gabriel and Bárbara appealed the decision, which they considered an aberration. They submitted a psychiatric study that supported their claims that the child benefited from living with them. "They have acted as good carers in the integral development of Lucía," read the study, which concluded that Lucía had internalized the couple as her mother and father.

The ruling also cited a report from Meniños, one of the foundations to which the IMMF outsources its treatment of neglected children, which was not in favor of Lucía staying with Gabriel and Bárbara. "The family has expressed its wish to adopt the minor despite being clear in principle that it was a temporary arrangement," it read. "In the most recent period the family has lost objectivity in its role as foster parents." They finally told them the child could not remain with them.

It was then the couple decided to flee. "We had to get away from our house as if we were criminals to stop them from taking her." Gabriel recalls the horror of those dark days. The couple knew the consequences of a separation, above all for children who had already suffered, and consulted with several specialists. All of them, according to the documentation they later brought forward, agreed: the consequences of a new separation would be devastating for Lucía. It would cause her psychological disturbances that might prevent her from having healthy emotional relationships in the future.

They made these conclusions known to the IMMF, the Minors' Prosecution Office and Children's Ombudsman, but it made no difference. The guardianship committee decided the child had to go back to a foster center to wait for a new life. The couple requested the decision be postponed until a judicial resolution was taken, but all they got back was a court order permitting the committee to enter their home. Seeing that the little girl was going to end up damaged and be denied stability, the couple brought a lawsuit applying for a preventive injunction.

The judge granted the measures, ordering that the little girl remain in her home until the final decision was taken. The judge asked for an evaluation from the court's psychosocial team, whose findings coincided with the information Gabriel and Bárbara had supplied: the most beneficial thing for the little girl was to continue with them.

However, everything made them suspect they would be separated from Lucía. In previous cases the courts had always sided with the guardianship committee. In its final conclusions the prosecutor said a child of that age does not suffer any damage from a change of family.

But finally, on March 1, the Madrid court dispelled those lingering doubts. "Above any other consideration, however legitimate, the higher interest of the child must prevail." In this case, that means continuing with Gabriel and Bárbara and taking the couple's surnames for life.