Caesarean case mother denied chance to keep baby in hospital It also emerged last night that Britain's most senior family judge, Sir James Munby, the President of the High Court Family Division, has personally intervened to take over the case. The incident has thrown the spotlight on activities of the Court of Protection, the branch of the High Court with powers to make life and death decisions about vulnerable people in private and send people to prison in secret for breaching its orders. MPs have also voiced alarm at the issues exposed by the case. It is understood that the mother had a history of "manic episodes" dating back several years and had been in and out of hospitals. She was pregnant when she came to Britain on a short visit in June of last year but her condition deteriorated after a panic attack and she was sectioned under the Mental Health Act. In August the local health trust secured an order from the Court of Protection for an order to have her child delivered under caesarean section citing "risks to mother and child." Although she was allowed to see her baby on the day of the birth and again on the following day, social workers from Essex County Council immediately applied for an order to have the child taken into care. Adoption proceedings were initiated and the woman was, according to a judge, "dispatched with undue haste" back to Italy. But she has since been receiving treatment for her condition and has been holding down a job and maintaining her own home as well as staging a legal battle to halt the adoption and win her daughter back. She returned to Britain earlier this year for a hearing at Chelmsford County Court at which Judge Roderick Newton found her to be articulate and coherent in making her case. Papers from the hearing disclose that the initial decision to take the child into care almost immediately after her birth was against even the wishes of doctors. Judge Newton noted: "The District Judge at the early stage gave permission for the Local Authority to withhold contact. I raise that because doctors appear to be saying at an early stage in the proceedings that the plan ought to be for [the child] to be placed with the mother, potentially in hospital. But he upheld the earlier decision insisting that this would not have been in the girl's interests. They asset out how the mother pledged to prove herself. She has suggested that the child remain with foster carers for a year so that she can demonstrate that she is committed to taking her medication. The offer was rejected and the court granted social services permission to place the child up for adoption. But last night a spokesman for the judiciary disclosed that Sir James had that the case be transferred to a higher court before an adoption order is granted. "The proceedings are not yet concluded," he said. The President has ordered that the matter be transferred to the High Court and any further applications in respect of the child are to be heard by him. Lucy Scott-Moncrieff, former president of the Law Society, said: "It is certainly not uncommon for children to be taken at point of birth away from their mothers if it's thought their mothers can't look after them. It's also not unknown for women to have caesarean sections ordered by the court and of course it's not unknown for people to be detained under the mental health act.